Apple’s nano-SIM patent will to be offered with royalty-free license

A few days back, it was reported online that Nokia and Apple were in a battle regarding the design of the new minute nano-SIM, which is apparently the next generation of the SIM design that is comparably even smaller than the current micro-SIM. Both Nokia and Apple have put forth their respective design of a nano-SIM with each claiming their own to be the better one.

So far, the Apple design seems to have the favourable vote amongst most European carriers and there is a good chance that it will be the one chose for general usage which has led to some fears that with Apple controlling the license of the necessary sim-card which a device needs to function, hundreds of other companies might be forced to pay some kind of royalty fees to them.

Now however, it seems that Apple has been developing this nano-SIM simply for the betterment of SIM standards and not to make a quick buck as a recent discovery by Florian Mueller of FOSS Patents shows. It has come to light that they will offer the license to its nano-SIM (regardless if it’s chosen as the standard SIM-card or not) patent royalty-free. This goes to say that other companies will not have to pay Apple a single cent to use their patent regarding the nano-SIM design on their devices.