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


To: Stock Farmer who wrote (75634)3/20/2008 3:08:28 PM
From: ohohyodafarted  Read Replies (2) | Respond to of 197227
 
Thank you Stock Farmer for a most interesting analysis of the problem. It seems to me that if your analysis is correct, that this is a no win situation for QCOM............

that is unless, you throw out all of NOK's points as unworkable and unreasonable, and view QCOM's method of of one price for all, as a FRANDly and sensible way to do business.
If I was Jugde trying to sort all of this out, I think I would ask the two parties to come to a fair an reasonable price for the BUNDLE approach, because the patent by patent approach opens up to many cans of worms and makes it much to difficult to come to a reasonable and timely settlement.

And if the parties came to an impass, then I would make the decission on how much is owed and by whom, for them. I think with that kind of ultimatum, the parties would find a way to make a settlement for fear that there could be a more unfavorable settlement for one or the other of the parties.

I hope that when the QCOM filing is available that you will be able to update us with another opinion. Perhaps we will be able to get a better idea of how this is all going to come down when we hear both sides of the issue.

Thank You!!!



To: Stock Farmer who wrote (75634)3/20/2008 3:13:11 PM
From: bronx  Read Replies (1) | Respond to of 197227
 
There is no reason why the sum of a few parts should not add up to more than the single licence. QCOM may be avoiding this because it is, as you note, costly to parse and dice. The customer (NOK) should expect to pay accordingly, and even pay more for a few even than for the bundle.

Cross-licencing in general assumes a similar "all applicable patents" approach, even when one party owes the other compensation.

NOK also has patents, and has been seeking injunctions vs QCOM (wasn't there something before the ITC?)---something it now claims Q cannot do. If it set a per-patent price, I wonder what it was?



To: Stock Farmer who wrote (75634)3/20/2008 3:18:50 PM
From: slacker711  Read Replies (1) | Respond to of 197227
 
The same logic of construction above must apply, so that whatever Qualcomm is charging to a third party for All of its patents, if fair and reasonable and non-discriminatory, must be equal to Value A plus Value B plus Value C.

I think you missed the point of the part of Nokia's deposition that I quoted. They are arguing precisely the opposite. The relationship isnt linear so you cant deconstruct the patent bundling into individual components.

The price of the first essential patent (Patent A), regardless of which one, is 2.5%. Adding a 2nd essential patent (Patent B) to the bundle takes the rate to 3.5%. However, if patent A expires or is no longer used, the fact that the relationship between the patents isnt linear means that you cant just substract 2.5% from your bundle. Instead, you would then be paying 2.5% for Patent B.

Slacker



To: Stock Farmer who wrote (75634)3/20/2008 6:37:35 PM
From: jackmore  Respond to of 197227
 
The same logic of construction above must apply, so that whatever Qualcomm is charging to a third party for All of its patents, if fair and reasonable and non-discriminatory, must be equal to Value A plus Value B plus Value C.

Nope. This is fundamentally the proportionality argument reformulated, or should I say morphed. No two licensees are likely to use the identical set of patents, nor for that matter the same number of patents at any given time. So how can that be FRANDLY? Because the rate is set so damn low that equity is achieved whenever the first patent is used. The rest are thrown into the bargain for free, as protection for the licensee from overcharging, and as protection to the licensor for frivolous cross-licensing suits. It's not bundling, as Nokia claims, but "license one-use all".

It's a helluva bargain at 4-5%. And it's based on well established principle in the U.S.

Of course it remains to be seen how persuasive Judge Strine finds the logical contortions of Nokia's read of ETSI rules and French law.