Silicon Investor (SI) -- The First Internet Community

STOCKTALK

We've detected that you're using an ad content blocking browser plug-in or feature. Ads provide a critical source of revenue to the continued operation of Silicon Investor. We ask that you disable ad blocking while on Silicon Investor in the best interests of our community. If you are not using an ad blocker but are still receiving this message, make sure your browser's tracking protection is set to the 'standard' level.

Technology Stocks : The New QUALCOMM - Coming Into Buy Range -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: pyslent who wrote (819)	8/14/2007 8:48:13 PM
From: slacker711	Read Replies (3) \| Respond to of 9132

My guess is that the video compression patents were part of the same general stategy. Qualcomm may have decided that they would not pursue patent infringement cases in areas that were not core to CDMA, but intended to keep ancillary IPR as weapons to be used only if infringing companies ever became "trouble-makers." As such, Broadcom was the first (and only) H.264-compliant vendor to receive this particular shot-across-the-bow. This strategy is effective only as long as there is no obligation to be non-discriminitory. Once FRAND rules are found to apply, the IPR becomes useless as a means to selectively exert power over a troublesome company. This was the motive behind Qualcomm's decision to not declare to the JVC, IMO. I pretty much agree with your entire post. The problem Qualcomm has is they must have thought that "participation" in a standards body would require active involvement in forming the standard (ie voting and proposals). It would seem that Brewster's ruling would mean that passively monitoring the standard through attending meetings would be enough. If this ruling sets a precedent, Qualcomm is going to run into major problems with their GPRS/EDGE suits. Slacker

To: pyslent who wrote (819)	8/15/2007 12:00:26 AM
From: Maurice Winn	Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 9132

It's not enough to "declare" that one has patents. One also has to say what the licensing terms will be. What if one hasn't got a clue whether one will even license them or what the terms requested will be and the standard being considered is not even part of the company's business? Maybe "to be advised" is okay on the declaration form as used back in 2002. It's very clear that QUALCOMM was so little involved in the standard that it was only by accident that some "participation" was discovered and that in a minor way. It seems to have been maintaining a watching brief for the most part, with attendance if convenient and the attendance was probably for other more interesting standards with an attendance at the relevant standard discussions to keep an eye on proceedings. The "disclosure" standards were always deliberately grey and ambiguous and they have only been tightened in the last couple of years. Before that, they were a mile wide. The issue is from 2001 and early 2002 when the silly "disclosure" requirements were far more loose. If QUALCOMM had been attending, in earnest, the Broadcom people wouldn't have needed careful search terms. They would have been well aware of attendance. Minutes would show QUALCOMM people there. QUALCOMM would have been making proposals, commenting etc. Judge Brewster seems to be making a mountain out of a molehill. He's in a snit because Louis Lupin allegedly, based on hearsay evidence reported in a newspaper, which is sometimes not admissible in a court, said that the case was a sensible one to bring because there was no downside. I said at the time that that wasn't a good enough reason to waste court time and legal fees. But it isn't a hanging offence. Standards bodies are not religious meetings where only true-believers go and the High Priest runs proceedings with infallibility and apostates are stoned to death. They are stupid lowest common denominator jamborees where those who can't go it alone, and those who want to form cartels go to get more money. Look at the ridiculous W-CDMA effort, which costs 12% royalties for example, with no advantage over the CDMA2000 4% royalty technology. QUALCOMM lawyers have agreed that testimony didn't match facts found elsewhere. From what I read, it wasn't much of a gap. Maybe they were panicking and brow-beaten, caught in the hazardous situation of defiance, or begging for mercy. When captured by the powerful, begging for mercy rather than defiant denial is normal human behaviour. Given Judge Rudi's ideas, it looks as though QUALCOMM won't be able to assert patents in the W-CDMA standard either as they probably didn't formalize a bunch of dotted i's and crossed t's, even though it was raved about since the mid 1990s right here in SI and the experts knew that QUALCOMM had a swarm of patents required for W-CDMA creation. No doubt the tightened standard of today will be applied retroactively to QUALCOMM at the end of the 20th century when L M Ericsson and other slime-ball guild members could lie with impunity that they invented CDMA and there was no need for QUALCOMM in W-CDMA aka VW-40. So QUALCOMM will no doubt be banned from selling ASICs in Europe too and no patents will be enforceable. China doesn't even bother with such niceties and simply declares TD-SCDMA to be their invention in total. Mqurice