Royalties in UK Law

The commercial background to the Agreement is that in March 2000 Dupont acquired a small Californian research and development company called Uniax Corporation, which then changed its name to Dupont Displays Inc. The business of Uniax consisted of the development of what is described as organic light-emitting display technology, which can be used to produce plastic and glass displays for a variety of purposes, including cellular telephones and portable computers.

84. In my view there are two fundamental factors that I must bear in mind in fixing the quantum meruit remuneration that Primus should receive for the service it provides in permitting calls originating from Orange to use its system. These are, first, that the remuneration must be reasonable in all the circumstances. Secondly, that the basis for calculation should be as simple as possible, so as to minimise the chances of future disputes over payments.

In deciding the basis on which the quantum meruit royalty rates should be agreed, it seems to me that I have to consider three further questions. The first is whether the basis of the rates should be the interconnect rates that ITHL receives from its two current interconnect providers BT and Orange. 11 This basis can be contrasted to a rate or rates based on the split of ultimate destinations and the costs of making those connections.

That is analogous to the basis for the BT Tariff in Schedule 1 of the Agreement. I strongly suspect that if the parties had been negotiating a tariff for Orange calls at the time the Agreement was concluded then they would have agreed an Orange tariff based on the interconnect fees paid by Orange to Core/ITHL. The royalty fees payable to Primus should then be recalculated by analogy with the provisions set out in clause 5.3.

Thus the rate will be 50.58%, 62.15% and 46.23% of the peak, off – peak and weekend interconnect rates that are paid by BT to ITHL, without any deduction for the rebate that ITHL pays back to T-Mobile under the terms of the Virtual Interconnect Agreement between T-Mobile and ITHL. That will make the position analogous to the situation between Orange, Core, ITHL and Primus.

Fifthly, laches is an equitable doctrine, under which delay can bar a claim to equitable relief. Although I would not suggest that it is an immutable requirement, some sort of detrimental reliance is usually an essential ingredient of laches, in my opinion.

They see no reason why the entire procedure for entry of the judgment, followed by its registration and the resort by the judgment creditor to the remedies provided by ROCA, culminating in an order for sale, should not be regarded for the purposes of section 254 as a process of execution. It can therefore be regarded as being not only a judgment but, in so far as it creates an automatic charge, part of the process of its own execution.