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

To: Clarksterh who wrote (53292)	7/6/2006 8:41:54 PM
From: Brihack	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 197013

Clark, Thanks for your input on patent life and the issue of the cumulative royalty rates for CDMA and Q's negotiated rate of approximately 4-5% versus many smaller amounts to various piecemeal companies X, Y & Z. On this latter issue, it seems to me that a large benefit of Qualcomm's licensing program is the pass-thru rights that a licensee obtains from Qualcomm (and its substantial list of licensees). On a different tangent, do you think that Qualcomm subsequently filed its fundamental CDMA patents (such as soft-handoff, power control, rake receiver, etc.) in any modified form for application to a wideband usage such as the eventual WCDMA standard? Or, as I suspect, the fundamental nature of these patents is the same whether applied in a narrowband or wideband context. Bri

To: Clarksterh who wrote (53292)	7/7/2006 12:59:20 AM
From: matherandlowell	Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 197013

"My guess is that in total they pay 2-3x the amount, but it is in the form of small amounts to each player - e.g. 1.5% to company X, 2.1% to company Y, ... . And like it or not the irrational payors will say 'but we only pay a max of 2% to anyone else so you are obviously ripping us off'. Everyone can justify to themselves paying 1-2% to company X, but not 5% to Qualcomm." Guys: I'm not sure I agree that this is a correct interpretation of what was said at this presentation. My understanding was that owners of relatively little IP were demanding 3 or 4 times the amount QCOM was asking for the overwhelming IP they own. This is, of course, the benefit of CDMA over WCDMA. The royalty stacking concept of WCDMA is the very problem that will make it (eventually) at a competitive disadvantage to CDMA. Irwin was very clever to devise the strategy in this way. If the Europeans wanted to paper over the patents of CDMA and formulate a standard based on CDMA plus some of their IP, he agreed to do that but only if the Europeans agreed to pay the QCOM standard rate. Now they understand that they haven't make a clean steal of the QCOM IP and they want the European courts to bail them out. If it is obvious to me, it will be obvious to the jurists of Europe. They can use the IP. They will just have to pay for it. Even if they add a couple of more bows and ribbons on the hood of the car, they will still have to pay to use the engine.// jay