In a July earnings call, Qualcomm President Steve Altman cited a handful of cases initiated by Qualcomm against rival Nokia Corp. and said that the outcomes would guide the chip vendor’s negotiations in a cross-licensing deal with the handset vendor. Those cases are summarized here to illustrate only how Qualcomm will judge its own strength in future negotiations.
Nokia has filed a roughly similar number of complaints in various courts and before regulatory bodies against Qualcomm-which are likely to carry at least as much weight in determining the merits of the two sides’ respective arguments-but those cases are not cited here.
(Qualcomm maintains a “legal newsroom” on its Web site with a summary of litigation it has launched, and some cases it has responded to, but without a comprehensive accounting of cases filed against it. Nokia does not maintain a Web-based summary of legal actions it has initiated.)
Phil Carson
May to October 2006: Qualcomm claims two patent infringements against Nokia in the U.K., Germany, France and Italy over GPRS/EDGE products. Case in Germany commences in September. Case in U.K. commences in November.
June 2006: Qualcomm files complaint with U.S. International Trade Commission requesting that certain Nokia handsets running on GSM/GPRS/EDGE networks-and allegedly infringing on Qualcomm patents-be barred from importation into the U.S. and that further sales of Nokia handsets already in the country be halted. Trial expected to commence in September.
March 2007: Nokia files complaints in Germany and The Netherlands against Qualcomm seeking to have Qualcomm patents involved in a 2000 agreement between Texas Instruments and Qualcomm declared “exhausted,” freeing Nokia from paying royalties on handsets containing that IPR. Qualcomm believes the German case has been “significantly delayed” while the case in The Netherlands is due to begin in September.
Source: Qualcomm Inc.
