The Fair Standards Alliance is delighted to grant ‘Friends of FRAND’ awards 2022 to Nicholas Banasevic, Michael Schlögl and Khushita Vasant.
The awards celebrate people who contribute to promotion of licensing standard essential patents (SEP) on fair, reasonable and non-discriminatory (FRAND) terms. In 2022, the ‘Friends of FRAND’ awards acknowledge contributions to the promotion of FRAND in three categories.
The award for Contribution to Enhancing Legal Certainty on FRAND Licensing of SEPs has been granted to Nicholas Banasevic, Managing Director at Gibson Dunn’s Brussels office. Until recently, Nicholas served as Acting Director at the European Commission’s Directorate General for Competition (DG COMP). In 20+ years at DG COMP, Nicholas led many high-profile antitrust investigations, particularly in digital and ICT markets. He also worked on virtually all SEP-related antitrust matters for the last two decades, including investigations into Samsung and Motorola on the use of injunctions that subsequently led to the CJEU ruling in Huawei v ZTE. This case law contributed to legal certainty on FRAND licensing by clarifying that by invoking SEP-based injunctions patent holders can anticompetitively abuse their market power.
The award for Advocacy Promoting FRAND Licensing of SEPs has been granted to Dr Michael Schlögl, Head of IP SEP at Continental. This award acknowledges the people who drive forward the debate to promote an open and collaborative approach for the licensing of SEPs. Michael is actively involved in the development of a licensing framework for SEPs in Europe. A holder of PhD in high energy physics, Michael has worked on IP matters since 2001. Having started his IP career with Siemens, Michael joined Continental in 2007, where he built up an IP department in Eastern Europe, and is now working on finding a resolution to the ongoing SEP licensing disputes in the automotive industry, including the determination of a FRAND rate for 4G cellular SEPs in the US.
The award for Raising Awareness About the Debate on FRAND Licensing of SEPs has been granted to Khushita Vasant, Chief Correspondent US Antitrust at MLex Market Insight. Khushita covers US antitrust enforcement and litigation for MLex in Washington, DC. She previously reported on EU competition law in Brussels where she broke news on high-profile antitrust and merger investigations. She’s often in federal courts across the US to report on civil and criminal antitrust litigation, and on Capitol Hill to cover developments on a set of critical antitrust bills pending in Congress. Khushita specialises in coverage on IP, with notable scoops on US policy developments and EU investigations in the field of SEPs. Her articles on SEPs have significantly contributed to raising awareness about the policy discourse, related litigation and developments in the industry.