InterDigital Inc (IDCC)

[Learning2vest]

Found myself wondering what the "smart" moves would be if one of us was a member of the advisory group calling the shots at IDCC right now. We would have a lot more information, but we can guess at some things. One guess would be that we are "all in" with the ICC arb panel at this point and nothing Nokia does will keep that panel from delivering a 2G award decision by May 31st.

We can certainly listen to any settlement offer Nokia chooses to afford, but where do we set the bar on what we should accept? Should we even consider accepting a 2G settlement at this point? If the ICC arb panel awards something less for 2G than Nokia offers as settlement(not likely IMO), there is still quite a bit of "legal capital" to be gained by waiting to obtain a Judgment result from the ICC Court.

InterDigital finally has Nokia backed into a corner after enduring several years of rowdy disrespect from them. What's wrong with letting Nokia come to grips with the reality of their current situation for at least 90 days? Give the other members of the "don't pay IDCC" gang some time to think things over. Some of those bad boys just might pick up the phone and call now that they see their leader hog tied and feeling the weight of impending justice.

IMO the numbers are going to get mighty big under WHATEVER 3G license the others end up signing with InterDigital, so it makes a lot of sense to get into serious negotiations while pre-payment discounts are still on the table in KOP. A 10% or better pre-payment discount on a big number is still a big number! The managements at Motorola, Samsung, LG, and Siemens are going to look mighty stupid if they let Nokia lead them into paying full price for 3G.

The next few months should be interesting to watch from over here in the IDCC longs peanut gallery. My best hope is that we will see everybody else settle up with InterDigital on 2G and ink "sweet heart" discount deals on 3G while Nokia is left waiting for the 2G ICC arb award(AND for SONY/Ericsson or somebody else to trigger their 3G rates).