By Menno Treffers, Matteo Sabattini and Alessandra Mosca

Standard Essential Patents (SEPs) can be hugely valuable. In particular, when the standard is used in mass-market consumer products, patents that are necessarily used create significant value for their owners. For companies large and small, the challenges are, first of all, to get their ideas used in the standards and then, if the standard is successful, to extract value (e.g. in the form of royalties) from their essential patents.