Acer Incorporated & Ors v Nokia Technologies Oy

A court may temporarily lift a case-management stay and amend a confidentiality regime where necessary to give practical effect to an appellate order and facilitate related arbitration. The court should assess the practical prejudice caused by withholding access against the administrative burden and confidentiality concerns raised in opposition. Where existing protections remain materially unchanged, advance re-notification and relabelling may be unnecessary. It may be appropriate to permit confidential material to be disclosed and used in the arbitration as a whole, rather than create a two-tier regime tied to particular issues, if the arbitral tribunal can control admissibility. The confidentiality order may also empower the tribunal to resolve designation and redaction disputes, avoiding unnecessary return to the court.

In two related patent actions, Acer, ASUS and Nokia were subject to a case-management stay imposed in connection with an impending arbitration. Acer and ASUS applied to amend the existing confidentiality regime so that documents produced in the proceedings could be disclosed to their arbitration representatives and used in the arbitration. The application also sought a limited lifting of the stay, following an Order of the Court of Appeal dated 11 June 2026 and the parties’ Adjustable Licences.

Nokia did not object in principle but argued that disclosure should await protective and production orders from the constituted arbitral tribunal. The dispute concerned the timing of disclosure, notification of affected third parties, relabelling, the scope of the amended regime and the tribunal’s powers.

Application granted. The court accepted the proposal to lift the case-management stay temporarily and for the limited purpose of amending the confidentiality regime. This was necessary to give practical effect to the Court of Appeal’s Order and the Adjustable Licences, and to enable the parties and their chosen legal representatives to prepare effectively for the arbitration.

1. The court agreed with the prejudice analysis advanced for Acer and ASUS. Waiting for the arbitral tribunal to be constituted could delay access for several months and impair preparation of the Request for Arbitration, the Answer and the nomination of arbitrators. It would also disadvantage chosen arbitration counsel, solicitors, experts and the tribunal. Nokia’s principal burden was the administrative work of notification and relabelling, which was less significant, particularly since existing confidentiality protections were not being altered.
2. Advance notice to third parties was unnecessary because the relevant parties had already been notified of the existing protections. Re-notification would delay disclosure without serving a sufficient protective purpose. Relabelling was also unnecessary because recipients understood that existing labels applied to the confidentiality order as amended and would receive the new Order.
3. The court adopted a pragmatic regime covering confidential materials generally, rather than limiting the amendment to documents connected with the final RAND licence issue. A narrower regime would create a two-tier system and require the court to decide whether disputed documents fell within the relevant issue. The arbitral tribunal could instead exclude irrelevant material from the arbitration.
4. The court rejected amendments that would permit confidential material to be used for the arbitration but not disclosed to or used in it. It also approved empowering the tribunal to resolve disputes about confidentiality designations, redactions and related matters, thereby simplifying the arbitration and avoiding unnecessary applications to the court.

The parties were directed to prepare a draft Order giving effect to these decisions.

This was a first-instance procedural application. The judgment records that the Court of Appeal had imposed a case-management stay and made an Order on 11 June 2026. No citation for that Order is stated. The stay was temporarily lifted for the limited purpose addressed in this judgment.