Vivo Tech GmbH, Vivo Mobile Communication Iberia SL, Vivo Mobile Communication Co., Ltd. v. Respondent

1

Paris Local Division

UPC_CFI_361/2025

of the Court of First Instance of the Unified Patent Court

delivered on 26/08/2025

concerning R. 9.1 and R. 9.3 (a) RoP

APPLICANTS

1)

Vivo Mobile Communication Iberia SL

Calle Orense 58, Planta 12 C

28020 - Madrid – ES

2)

3)

Vivo Tech GmbH

Speditionstrasse 21

40221 - Düsseldorf – DE

Vivo Mobile Communication Co., Ltd.

No. 1, Vivo Road, Chang'an Town

523866 - Dongguan City, Guangdong - CN

Represented by

Dr Georg Andreas Rauh

RESPONDENT

1)

Sun Patent Trust

437 Madison Avenue, 35th Floor

10022 - New York - US

Represented by

Sabine Agé

2

PATENT AT ISSUE

Patent no.

Proprietor

EP3852468

Sun Patent Trust

DECIDING JUDGE

Presiding judge &

Camille Lignières

Judge-rapporteur

LANGUAGE OF PROCEEDINGS: English

ORDER

of the facts and proceedings

In the context of an infringement action brought before the present Division on April 18, 2025,

SUN PATENT TRUST requested protection for certain information considered confidential under

Art. 58 UPCA and R. 262A RoP.

Following a case management meeting on the confidentiality issue with all the representatives,

the judge rapporteur issued an order on July 3, 2025, allowing the defendants to provide their

comments on the request filed under R 262A by setting a provisional confidentiality circle allowing,

in particular, the defendants' representatives and their “legal team” to have access to all the

documents in the file “unredacted,” and provided that the starting point for the time limits for

filing a Preliminary Objection (PO) or the Statement of Defense (SoD) would take effect upon the

final order on the confidentiality regime, in these terms: “The Court's order setting the

confidentiality regimes and granting access to the Confidential and Highly Confidential Information

shall specify that the proceedings deadlines agreed between the parties, i.e. one month for any

Preliminary objection and three months for the Statement of Defense, shall run as of the date of

this order.” Moreover, one natural person from the Defendants was allowed to have access to the

names of the Claimant’s licensees.

The final order establishing a confidentiality circle for access to information classified as

confidential was issued by the full panel on July 31, 2025. The claimant challenged the composition

of the confidentiality circle for access to information classified as “highly confidential” and

appealed on this point. Leave to appeal was granted, and a request for suspensive effects was filed

before the Court of Appeal.

It appears from the parties' explanations that SUN PATENT TRUST asked VIVO’s representatives

not to grant immediate access to the three natural persons mentioned in the order of July 31,

provided that they intended to file an appeal, and VIVO voluntarily complied with this request.

Against this background, VIVO requested clarification from the Judge rapporteur on the starting

point of the time limits for filing a PO (one month R. 19 RoP) and the SoD (three months according

to R. 23 RoP).

According to VIVO, the time period did not begin to run because the order of July 31 July 2025 was

not voluntarily enforced by the parties and because that order did not expressly mention that it

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constituted the starting point for the filing of the PO and the SoD. VIVO submitted an alternative

request for extension time under R.9.3 RoP.

According to SUN PATENT TRUST, the starting point should be set at the date of the present order,

and alternatively the Claimant requests that: “ the deadline for filing a preliminary objection and

the Statement of defence on the claims under A.I., A.III., and B of the Operative Part of the

Statement of claim will start at the date of its order; the deadline for responding to Operative Part

A.II. of the Claimant’s Statement of claim will start at the date of the Court of Appeal decision

against the order of 31 July 2025. “

Grounds

Concerning the request on the starting point of the time limits (runtime of terms for fili