InterDigital Inc (IDCC)

[olddog967]

mickey: Your apparent attempt at sarcasm shows that you have no concept regarding Qualcomm's patents and their licensing. Simply put your so called “damn fools” are not paying for expired patents, but are paying for the thousands of patents that Qualcomm has covering newer standards.

The following is a year 2000 Q and A post that was written in non technical or legal language so it is easy to understand. It is still applicable.

“Can any one help with information regarding the time frame for expiration of Qualcomm's claim on CDMA?

canesman: There really isn't an easy answer to this question. There is no one "CDMA patent" to expire soon. QCOM has over 400 CDMA-related patents dating back to 1990, and 600 more patents pending. So, while the first patents will begin expiring around 2007, there will be many more in play for decades beyond that, as new patents keep being applied for and granted.

I don't know how much experience you have with patent licensing, but typically with big companies like this it isn't a matter of QCOM saying "Patent #1234567 will cost $1.50, #2345678 will cost $2.23, and ...."

They tend to work on a portfolio basis, where they say "To license all of these related patents will cost xxx", where xxx may be a fixed amount, or a percentage of some benchmark (perhaps the list price of the finished goods).

So even if the original 100 patents expire by 2010, there will probably be 500 more in effect that comprise the "CDMA portfolio". And the next year when 50 more (or whatever) expire there may be 60 new ones to take their place. Thus, as long as someone wants *any* of QCOM's CDMA patents, they basically pay for them all as a bundle.

And because some of the patents pending relate to both CDMA2000 and W-CDMA, whichever way the handset and infrastructure manufacturers choose to go, they will need some of QCOM's patents. Undoubtedly there will come a point when all of the "essential" CDMA patents (those that can't be worked around) will have expired, but that may be 15-20 years from now, and in the meantime QCOM will likely have received patents on newer "gotta have" technologies for 3.5G or 4G.

So I wouldn't worry too much about QCOM losing their Intellectual Property Rights (IPR) anytime soon….”

http://boards.fool.com/gtgtgtgtcan-any-one-help-with-information-13171302.aspx


To expand on the year 2000 comment that “QCOM will likely have received patents on newer "gotta have" technologies for 3.5G or 4G”, at the time of the above comment it stated that “QCOM has over 400 CDMA-related patents dating back to 1990, and 600 more patents pending”. Compare that with the number of patents in Qualcomm’s current portfolio which is what licensees are now paying for:

5 Jul 2017
Qualcomm has a total of 46,489 granted patents and 106,500 patent applications distributed into 28,730 patent families. Based on the countries of patent applications, the key markets for Qualcomm are USA, WIPO(PCT) and European Patent Office. The main technology areas are wireless communication networks, transmission of digital information and transmission.

http://www.patsnap.com/resources/innovation/qualcomm