Nokia, Qualcomm Move Forward With Non-Patent-Fight-Based Relationship
from the wonders-never-cease dept
Qualcomm and Nokia have been involved in a long-running series of patent disputes over chips in mobile phones. The two companies settled the bulk of their disputes last summer, with Nokia throwing a chunk of change at Qualcomm and the two making nice. This week, the two companies announced they'd work together to put Qualcomm chips in Nokia devices. Nokia, the top global handset vendor, has never used Qualcomm chips, and the work will first be focused on devices for the US market, where Nokia's market share lags far behind its share in the rest of the world. So Qualcomm gets a big new chip customer, Nokia strengthens its offerings for the US markets, and consumers benefit from increased competition. Sounds good all around, and makes you wonder why the companies resisted such an approach in favor of the patent fight for so long.Thank you for reading this Techdirt post. With so many things competing for everyone’s attention these days, we really appreciate you giving us your time. We work hard every day to put quality content out there for our community.
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Filed Under: chips, mobile phones, patents
Companies: nokia, qualcomm
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Nokia took the low path.
The reason it took so long is that Nokia was looking for a free ride. This forced Qualcomm to have to vigorously explain what patent property rights mean.
Ronald J. Riley,
Speaking only on my own behalf.
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Direct (810) 597-0194 / (202) 318-1595 - 9 am to 9 pm EST.
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Re: Nokia took the low path.
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Re: Nokia took the low path.
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When the "system" is operating properly and issues are managed and dealt with by businessmen, including lawyers that think like businessmen, and not businessmen who react with a knee jerk and lawyers who think solely in terms of legal liability, many of these "battle of wills" would not arise.
Patents do have the salutory effect of being a catalyst for such deals, but it is important for these deals to happen that full control of the matter remain in the hands of the businessmen and not turned over by default to lawyers simply because a patent (or copyright) is involved.
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Chipsets?
So how does this "strengthen" Nokia in the US market? It sounds to me more like this is probably part of the settlement Nokia make with Qualcomm, i.e. Nokia only agreed to use Qualcomm chips in some of its phones in return for Qualcomm dropping the infringement suit, not because it would "strengthen its offerings".
"Nokia strengthens its offerings for the US markets"? Pffft.
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