14 DAY TRIAL // Last week we reported that Xiaomi’s rise in the world of smartphones hit a wall in India, where the company was ordered by the Delhi High Court to stop selling their handsets.
The trouble was the Chinese company was found guilty of infringing on a few Ericsson Standard Essential Patents (SEPs). It’s not like Ericsson didn't want to deal with this issue on more amiable terms, but apparently Xiaomi chose to ignore the communications sent out by Ericsson.
So at some point Ericsson had enough of being ignored and decided to take a more drastic approach. The company has unleashed similar patent wars on other device makers like Micromax, Gionee and Intex.
The court order said that Xioami was banned from importing its products and selling them in the country. Even more, authorities were directed to visit Xiaomi’s officers in order to make sure everything went according to the court’s instructions.
Xiaomi has been granted a second chance
Anyway, at the time of that report we were wondering whether Xioami would be able to sell handsets in India ever again.
Well, the Press Trust of India has the answer to that question: apparently, the Delhi High Court has allowed Xiaomi to keep selling their handsets in the country until January 8.
But wait, there’s a twist. According to the information, only devices running on Qualcomm’s Snapdragon processor fall under the agreement.
This means Xiaomi will be allowed to market the Mi 3, Redmi 1S and Redmi Note 4G. But the first two models aren't even available for purchase anymore and the Redmi Note 4G has yet to be launched.
The smartphone which Xiaomi was hot on selling prior to the ban is the Redmi Note, but the company will have to abandon it since it runs on a MediaTek processor.
Xiaomi has to act fast
Judging by all of this, it seems the Delhi High Court has a dark sense of humor. However, Xiaomi could attempt to launch the Redmi Note 4G ahead of schedule or resume the sales of the 1S or Mi 3.
For the time being, Xiaomi hasn't reached out to announce what its strategy is going to be, but once this happens, we will update you.
Xiaomi has a few weeks left until the ban comes back in, so it should move fast if it hopes to gain some profit out of this grace period.
The Chinese company made a debut on the Indian market not so long ago, and after just two months since its arrival, it already managed to grab 1.5% of the country’s smartphone market. However, the Ericsson incident will certainly pull Xiaomi backwards.
