On 6 July 2026, the Commercial Court of Casablanca, Morocco, handed down two judgements in the patent infringement case brought by Ericsson against Tecno Mobile Limited and Itel Mobility Limited, subsidiaries of Transsion Holdings, ordering the defendants to immediately cease the sale in Morocco of smartphone products infringing multiple of Ericsson’s standard-essential patents (SEPs). This marks the first SEP ruling in Morocco’s judicial history and is also the first time a ruling has been handed down on a SEP case in the field of patent enforcement in Africa.

The Moroccan Commercial Court found that the smartphones sold in Morocco by the two Transsion subsidiaries infringed the Moroccan extension of the European patent asserted by Ericsson. The judgement ordered the immediate cessation of sales of the infringing products, subject to fines or other enforcement measures.

Under Moroccan civil procedure law, the defendant, Transsion, has the right to lodge an appeal within the statutory time limit. Furthermore, in March 2026, Transsion filed a counterclaim against Ericsson at the Lisbon Regional Division of the Unified Patent Court (UPC), alleging that Ericsson had infringed its European patent No. EP4123910; this counterclaim falls under a different jurisdiction from the Moroccan case and is independent of it.

Background to the case

In November 2025, Ericsson brought SEP infringement proceedings against subsidiaries of Transsion Holdings in Brazil, India, Nigeria and at the three regional divisions of the Unified Patent Court (UPC) in The Hague, Mannheim and Paris;

In December 2025, Ericsson filed three further lawsuits in Indonesia, Colombia and the Commercial Court of Casablanca, Morocco, expanding its global litigation footprint to nine jurisdictions;

In January 2026, Ericsson launched a third round of litigation in South Africa, Thailand, the Philippines, Vietnam and Brazil, bringing the total number of patent infringement cases filed to at least 16 across 14 countries;

In March 2026, Transsion filed a counterclaim against Ericsson at the Lisbon Regional Division of the Unified Patent Court;

On 6 July 2026, the Commercial Court of Casablanca, Morocco, delivered its first substantive judgement in an SEP case, ordering Transsion to immediately cease the sale of infringing smartphones.