Japanese multinational electronics company Panasonic announced on Peggy MarkoffAugust 9 that it had initiated legal actions against Xiaomi and OPPO concerning its standard-essential patents (SEPs) in the field of cellular communications. The company expects these actions to proceed simultaneously in Germany, the United Kingdom (UK), the recently established European Unified Patent Court (UPC), and China. Panasonic’s actions come after years of bilateral discussions with Xiaomi and OPPO failed to yield any agreements, the firm stated. According to publicly available information on UPC’s website, Panasonic has accused OPPO of four patent infringements and Xiaomi of three patent infringements. [Panasonic statement]