Maurice, your unbridled optimism, both here and on the G* threads makes for an always lively read.
(Now... all this unbridled cheerleading wouldn't be some malevolent plot to harm short side investors, would it? <g>)
Seriously, please take projections from the CDG with the same grains of salt (large grains, like New Zealand sea salt) as from the GSM trade group. I don't even want to waste the space debunking the FUD in the CDG numbers as well as the interpretation in leaving out the combined GSM/TDMA installed base.
You are assuming "fair and non-discriminatory" means the same net rates for both unilateral and patent pooling IPR licensing. It does not. The "pool rate" is only applicable to members of the pool. The "unilateral" rate otherwise would prevail.
I do not advocate Q joining any patent pool, but simply point out that no, you don't get it both ways - you can't license your own IPR at the unilateral rate, and then hope to license everybody else's at the pool rate.
To use a grossly simplistic mathematical example, assume an industry composed of nine players of equal sales and with equal IPR and a tenth, call it Q, of unknown sales and some unequal IPR. Each of the nine are willing to license their IPR to all comers at 1% royalty each.
The tenth, Q, demands 5% as it's "all comers" rate.
The gang of nine get together and figure out that as relates to their group, the IPR situation is a wash, since they have equal sales and 1% royalty value each. So they pool their patents and everybody in the group of nine gets to use all those patents royalty-free. But each of the nine still charges "all other comers" 1%.
Each of the nine pays the tenth, Q, 5%. Q, in order to play in this industry, must pay the 1% outsider rate to each of the nine, for the products in this standard Q sells.
So, in this simple example, player Q collects 5% from everybody on all sales, but pays out 9% to the pool members on its own sales. The irony of this equation is that the bigger the piece of the sales pie player Q gets, the more it pays to the gang of nine and the less it receives from them. But if player Q doesn't step up to the sales plate and play in the game, the standards will ultimately pass it by, and at a point in time, it will get nothing.
You can see however, that by far the best position to be in is player Q, assuming that the referees in the game catch any cheaters, which, unfortunately, may be out there in the real world hoping to bend or break the rules and get away with it.
And, it also turns out in the real world that the playing fields aren't totally level, and that the mythical gang of nine will use its sheer mass to stop the singleton wherever possible.
You are certainly entitled to believe the moon is made of green cheese, GSTRF stock will sell at $200 by the end of 2001, WCDMA exists only as a PR ploy, and QCOM will collect $20 billion a year in royalties for perpetuity. Whatever... it's wishful thinking in the real world.
And Maurice, Nokia owning the ASIC division would be a fatal end of game blunder. That's the whole enchilada - where all the engineers are, guy! The QTL segment is a bunch of lawyers and corporate overhead. Do you think lawyers invented this stuff!
People don't just sit around in corporate headquarters with lawyers inventing things (except maybe at IDCC). They do it because there is a practical product problem that needs to be solved - and that's the necessity that mothers the IPR. Kill the product, kill the stream of innovation.
When the main product becomes the DS mode, not MC, same rule applies. If you don't play in product, game over. (Please note past financial results of IDCC with the non-product tollbooth-only business model.)
Maurice, if my "clueless posters" comment touched a nerve, so be it. If the shoe fits... but I know that in reality you are far from naive.
Just as long as not too many lurkers are led astray by the bombast, I have no problem with the entertaining rah-rah. Unfortunately, a lot of people who bought QCOM in the last six months did believe the "one-way tollbooth" and WCDMA is vaporware crap, to the detriment, now, of us all. Let's try not to perpetuate any more myths.
Sincere regards,
Allan |
