Context: Opus was specifically designed to avoid known existing patents, except for ones that are available royalty-free [1]. If Fraunhofer and Dolby believed Opus infringed on their patents they could have said so a decade ago, but instead they've waited for it to become widely deployed.
This is also a peculiar choice from Dolby because the patents that do cover Opus are licensed with an exception for companies that sue saying they have patents covering Opus [2]. Dolby has at least one product that uses Opus [3] so if this pool goes ahead and sues someone then it looks like Dolby is open to being sued themselves.
[2] "If you ... file a Claim for patent infringement against any entity alleging that an Implementation in whole or in part constitutes direct or contributory patent infringement ... then any patent rights granted to you under this License shall automatically terminate retroactively as of the date you first received the grant."
This is also a peculiar choice from Dolby because the patents that do cover Opus are licensed with an exception for companies that sue saying they have patents covering Opus [2]. Dolby has at least one product that uses Opus [3] so if this pool goes ahead and sues someone then it looks like Dolby is open to being sued themselves.
[1] https://www.opus-codec.org/license/
[2] "If you ... file a Claim for patent infringement against any entity alleging that an Implementation in whole or in part constitutes direct or contributory patent infringement ... then any patent rights granted to you under this License shall automatically terminate retroactively as of the date you first received the grant."
[3] https://professional.dolby.com/product/dolby-voice/dolby-voi...