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Technology Stocks : Qualcomm Moderated Thread - please read rules before posting -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Jim Mullens who wrote (48438)	11/4/2005 2:58:00 PM
From: slacker711	Read Replies (3) \| Respond to of 196425

The Q should immediately advise its handset and carrier partners that effective Jan 1 2006, thanks to BRCM, TXN, NOK, ERICY, NEC, Panasonic and the EC, and in “fairness to all” / compliance with FRAND, the Q will be eliminating the “unfair” practice of “price netting” resulting in the effective handset royalty payable to the Q increasing by approximately $1.50 per handset based on a $200 ASP for those handsets with a Q chipset. Until a lawyer chimes in with a different viewpoint, I think it is a fantasy to believe that Qualcomm can unilaterally raise the IPR rates on existing licenses. Slacker

To: Jim Mullens who wrote (48438)	11/4/2005 3:37:28 PM
From: pyslent	Respond to of 196425

Solution 1 is no doubt the best approach... Another possible solution is to break up the company. As alluded to by Rich Sulpezio as a rationale for Spinco, there's an inherent paradox to Q's business model that always seemed like a tough sell to chipset customers: "We'll sell you a chip, but you don't actually have the right to use it until you talk to our lawyers at QTL and make a separate arrangement to compensate us for IPR." What exactly are these customers buying, the raw silicon? It must be particularly grating when GSM pass-through rights are revealed: "By the way, our chips come with right to use all the underlying technolgy/IPR royalty-free, except, obviously, the technology we developed ourselves. That, you still have to license separately." I would not be surprised if price netting were the only way to placate chipset customers and I doubt it would be easy to ask them to give that up!