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Technology Stocks : Qualcomm Incorporated (QCOM) -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Jim Mullens who wrote (144593)	8/28/2006 11:15:23 AM
From: carranza2	Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 152472

Jim, The non-assert contained in the 2001 agreement which expired in 2004 is IMO absolutely critical to understanding the tangle. Slacker needs to be commended for pointing out its significance: Message 22751863 It establishes that Q and NOK were discussing the issue before 2001, and decided on a three year non-assert period. I obviously don't know how the non-assert was decided upon, but I suspect that it had to do with the fact that it bringing up the issue then was simply too difficult and contentious to deal with at the time. Moreover, it was probably mutual, binding NOK not to assert any of its IPR in EvDO until the non-assert expired. It might have also been part of the "price" for Nokia not requiring royalties in its GSM IPR as part of the cross-license to Q, which we assume is royalty free. I don't know. No one here knows. If anyone does, they are bound by confidentiality agreements and cannot say. Nonetheless, I can see scenarios in which there are lots of reasons for the non-assert, some favorable to Q, some not. One thing I can say with some measure of confidence, however, is that the timeliness and "patent ambush" issues are dead, dead, dead. It would be nice if the simple scenarios which we have cooked up about ETSI and its requirements having much significance were relevant, but I am now convinced that they aren't because there were clearly private dealings between NOK and Q which will trump any ETSI rules. This has been a fascinating exercise, one which has taken a meandering course through a lot of law, history, strategy, tactics, etc., but IMO it is time to move on to the issue which has not been considered and which has the potential to play an equally important role in Q's ultimate valuation for many years into the future: NOK's IPR in EvDO. As a starting point, I would suggest that NOK is more vulnerable to Q's claims than vice versa because Q's IPR cuts across the vast majority of NOK's product line whereas NOK's possible IPR in EvDO does not affect Q as much. However, no one should underestimate the value to NOK of such IPR as a negotiating tool, if it exists. I understand a natural reluctance to look at this issue, but we need to in order to get a good view of the bigger picture. Unfortunately, there is very little public information on the subject, which of course bothers me. The result of such an inquiry might be very positive. Assuming that there is NOK IPR in EvDO and Q IPR in the GSM family of standards, I can definitely see another non-assert as part of the ultimate solution to the present tangle as well as royalty-free access on the part of Q to NOK's IPR while Q gets a royalty paying license from NOK for Q's CDMA IPR. In other words, a resolution which was remarkably similar to the previous deal. There is one new consideration, however: OFDMA and Q/Flarion's IPR in WiMAX. And how that gets resolved is something I cannot even begin to think about. In addition to NOK's EvDO IPR, I suggest it is another worthy subject we need to get our collective arms around. C2@ignoranceis NOTbliss.com