Apple slapped with $2bn lawsuit for infringing European patent

Apple has been reportedly sued by a German company for infringing on a European patent essential to 3G and LTE devices.

The company IPCom is seeking damages of over 2 billion dollars for the alleged infringement of the patent it owned.

According to The Verge, Apple and a group of other major companies, including Nokia, HTC, and Vodafone, previously challenged the patent's validity, but the European Patent Office ultimately held up a narrower version of it last month.

The patent covers a technology that allows a device to receive priority on a network in the event of an emergency, even if the network is congested and it has been used to sue Nokia, among others, as well.

IPCom's primary business is licensing these mobile communication patents to manufactures in the industry, and like many other of its patents, this one too had been acquired from another company.

The company has also claimed infringement of a German patent that involves cell network communications as well, but it hasn't yet stated how much it's looking for in damages.

The report said that Apple might ultimately end up licensing at least one of the two patents under contention, should it be found to have infringed them.