Japanese patent management firm Uldage has kicked off licensing activities for its UHD satellite TV broadcasting standards patent pool, releasing some terms of the activities, while retaining specifics on the 88-strong patent portfolio. We initially suspected they included HEVC and HDR patents, as well as multiplexing and broadcasting, but Uldage made it clear that compression at least was specifically excluded. Essentially, if anyone wants to deliver 4K or 8K content in Japan, there is no other option than to cough up and license these patents from Uldage, and it plans to expand its UHD patent portfolio to IPTV and CATV. This is why Japan is such a closed shop – the companies which take the royalties including Fujitsu, Hitachi Maxell,…