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

To: Maurice Winn who wrote (76761)	5/1/2008 8:26:14 AM
From: Stock Farmer	Respond to of 197056

Aaah... not paying money owed... on which contract? In order to find a breach of contract, first a contract must be found. Which, as JGoren pointed out, is the crux on which this whole thing turns. Interestingly enough, Nokia has not yet been found to infringe on any of Qualcomm's patents. Oh, they probably are infringing somewhere, but the point at law is that they have not yet been found to infringe. Look at the hoops Qualcomm is going through over the chip-equivalent of a volume knob, and look to see how long this infringement activity has been taking... if we tread this path it will be 2012 before that issue is settled... on the first set of patents. Offset this with the likely assertion by Nokia of its own handful of patents and we have the 2010 equivalent of a good old fashioned naval battle, where two men of war stand broadside to each other and discharge cannons until one (or both) sink. If, as Qualcomm asserts, implicit extension under California law prevails over plain language explicit written extension, then of course Nokia has breached the contract that extended. Not only by failure to submit the contracted fees at the contracted schedule, but also by asserting patents contrary to non-assert clause. Nokia would thereby be in a world of hurt. However, if, as Nokia asserts, extension was contracted to only occur in writing, then there is no contracted amount Nokia is obliged to pay. Instead, obligations fall to Qualcomm as the patent holder to identify infringement and prosecute, or present invoices... patent by patent or buckets at a time. In this case, the implicitness of the ETSI agreement becomes an important issue, but there is ambiguity with respect to the amounts owed. Lo and behold the judiciary has been called in. Indeed, all elements of this case have been before judges who have determined that indeed there is merit here for trial, based on information that [redacted] we are forced to [redacted] and can't [redacted]. So it's not as simple as anyone on this thread (myself included) might be making out.