Zeev's Turnips Patch-No Politics (ZEEV)

[phill]

Zeev, the IP in wireless resides, in very great part, with QCOM.

There are 2 important numbers which bear out this observation.

• 100%. QCOM will ultimately collect royalties on 100%, or very nearly 100%, of all wireless handsets (and probably base sets) sold. When the world adopts, in great measure, wCDMA as a successor technical standard to the presently dominant GSM, QCOM's royalty dominance will extend to that segment of wireless chips, too. Of course one needs to remember that "ultimately", in this case, could be a very long time in some locations (read: western Europe)

• 5%. QCOM gets, and probably will continue to get, a lot bigger share (per unit) of royalties than does/will any other entity. It is generally believed that QCOM receives a royalty of about 5% of the wholesale price of each unit. Exact royalty rates remain shrouded in the embroglio of the confidential contracts these companies make with each other, but the general rules are, to my best knowledge, somewhere in the vicinity of those cited by this posting (from the iHub NOK board):

"...Qualcomm royalty has been decided as all the major handset vendors have signed WCDMA licensing agreements with Qualcomm at the same rate as in their prior agreements with Qualcomm (in the 5% range). It is my understanding that the other parties would be participating in the pool arrangement. The total of that pool would be in the neighborhood of 1 percent of the manufactures wholesale ASP." (#1172426)

I cannot vouch for the individual who posted these numbers (5%/1%), and the royalty split is neither public info nor even finally determined, as yet. But I think he's in the neighborhood.

You may recall that this extended discussion began with some conversation about IDCC and its claims of expansive royalty deals. I think it's important to note that IDCC's royalties, such as they might be, would be a share of the 1% pool split mentioned by the NOK board poster, along with NOK's share, MOT's share, Siemen's share, ERICY's share, etc, etc.

regards.

phill