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

To: Dave who wrote (15518)	9/25/1998 5:32:00 PM
From: mmeggs	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 152472

Of course, in the meantime, Q can roll merrily along building cdma2000 systems in a couple years, while ERICY fights them in court trying to prove it has the right to build W-CDMA. Hey, whatever.

To: Dave who wrote (15518)	9/25/1998 5:42:00 PM
From: Ramus	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 152472

Dave, I'm not sure I understand you. Qualcomm pioneered CDMA for use in a mobile environment. As you know CDMA based on the IS-95 standard has been around for some years. According to the Qualcomm website "QUALCOMM has an extensive CDMA patent portfolio with over 130 CDMA patents issued and approximately 400 patent applications pending in the United States, Europe, Japan, Korea, China and elsewhere around the world." You said "However, the Q is claiming that the current W-CDMA propsal/standard infringes on their. That is different from the ETSI current W-CDMA proposal/standard infringes on the Q's IP. Therefore, the Q's position is a bit biased." I'm not sure what you're saying here. I have read where the ETSI has asked Qualcomm what their intentions are vis-a-vis W-CDMA and Qualcomms IPRs. Qualcomm has said they will not license a standard that is not backward compatible with IS-95 and other standards. Biased? If their claims of infringement are valid? As a shareholder I would hope so! Yes, I suppose in the end whether or not a standard infringes IPR could be decided in the courts. Ericsson has stated that the standard doesn't infringe Qualcomms IPRs. So we shall see what we will see. If there is a Dec 31 deadline then the next few months should be very interesting. W.

To: Dave who wrote (15518)	9/25/1998 7:07:00 PM
From: Maurice Winn	Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 152472

Dave, You said: "The only way to find out if the ETSI's W-CDMA proposal/standard infringes on the Q's IP is court." Not really, you can hire lawyers, read the patents, understand the technology, study case law, read the patent law, consider the countries involved and predict what the courts will decide. Engineers, doctors and all of us model expected future outcomes like this all the time to predict the future. Gregg Powers says we can't predict the future, but while that is true, we can do a pretty good job of it most of the time. We have no choice. We have to predict the future and do it all day every day. Some are short term predictions such as "If I want milk I can get it at the corner store". Some are long term ones such as "If I buy Qualcomm at $51, I'll be able to retire and live happily ever after when I'm 60 years old". So, while it is true that a court test with political and military support is the ultimate test, nearly always, people are able to predict the future with sufficient clarity that they don't need to go down that path. They negotiate a better way forward. They can predict what courts will decide and act accordingly. The lawyers of the two parties can discuss their respective predictions and see if they agree. If they don't, they can investigate further and enhance their predictive powers. Sometimes a test is the only way to decide. The cdma2000 issue seems very robustly in favour of Qualcomm. The L M Ericsson blustering is very evidently just that. They have little negotiating strength. They can only damage their own interests by delaying agreement. They can damage others interests too, but much less than they damage their own. So they will want an early solution. They don't want a court case. Neither does Qualcomm. Of course Qualcomm's position is biased. They own the patents! I want to be paid big, huge, mountains of royalties for the years and years and years of waiting for cdmaOne and cdma2000 to succeed. If L M Ericsson and others don't like that, they should learn to. Just to correct another idea. Some people suggest that because Qualcomm gets royalties, they will be able to better compete in handsets and infrastructure. That is false. If the handset and infrastructure people can't make money and compete without royalty subsidy, they should be sacked and sent to work for Nokia. It is fair enough to use royalties to establish the business, the same as Omnitracs profits funded cdmaOne developments. But they must not be thought of as any kind of discount able to be offered as lure to subscribers. That is called bludging. A bit like L M Ericsson is trying to do. In big companies it is always a risk. Mqurice