Bonum Certa Men Certa

In the US and Elsewhere, Qualcomm's Software Patents Are a Significant Tax Everyone Must Pay

Welfare for a fossil of a company which bullies real companies (like Microsoft still does) without really creating anything

Phone and USPTO



Summary: The state of the mobile market when companies such as Qualcomm, which don't really produce anything, take a large piece of the revenue pie

Qualcomm does not make phones. At least not anymore. The same is true for Microsoft (with rare, minor exceptions here and there). Yet they want to be paid for every phone produced (raising prices considerably). They're like patent trolls -- the very same thing that BlackBerry and Nokia gradually become as their sales flat-line near 0. Their stockpiling of patents, they believe, is their last remaining 'asset' in the mobile market (Nokia, BlackBerry, Ericsson and Microsoft also feed patent trolls for this purpose). Various software patents, granted by the USPTO before Alice, account for the lion's share of the said patents, the rest being on hardware, radio, etc. Please note that we are not opposing hardware patents like this one just covered by Patently-O or material-related patents like the one just covered by Managing IP. In the case of Qualcomm, a lot of their patents are on software (their former chiefs advocated these patents last month), so we stand on pretty firm ground when we oppose these. So does Florian Müller, who has just found out that "Qualcomm's involuntary refund to BlackBerry amounts to approximately $5 per device" and added:



The term "specified number of subscriber units from 2010 through the end of 2015" in Qualcomm's press release on this month's arbitration award could mean all or some of the devices BlackBerry sold during the period in question. What I'm interested in (because I believe many readers will be curious, too) is what indication the "rebate" gives us with a view to Qualcomm's standard-essential patent (SEP) royalty demands. A couple of months ago I saw indications, by deducing and inferring information from certain public documents, that Apple may have been paying Qualcomm approximately $20 for its baseband chip and a second amount like that for patent license (a total of $40 per device for the chip and the license). The higher the rebate is on a per-unit basis, the more likely it is that Qualcomm's royalty demands are really that high (we're talking about stratospheric heights compared to what other companies are rumored to receive; for example, financial investors appear to believe that Nokia receives about $2 per device from Apple).

So let's look at publicly-available information in the light most favorable to Qualcomm: that the "royalty cap" applied to all BlackBerry smartphones sold in the years 2010-2015. Not only is that most favorable to Qualcomm but it's also a reasonable assumption.


How many of the patents in question are no longer valid after Alice and what will regulators say about Qualcomm's anticompetitive practices?

"We live in a world where journalism about patents is composed by non-scientists who speak to lawyers, not scientists."We certainly hope that Qualcomm will just disappear. It contributes nothing and takes away from everyone.

Suffice to say, the patent microcosm is supportive of Qualcomm. They push the bogus narrative of "inventors" (who create nothing) being "robbed". Some take this further and pretend that it's the root of all the problems in the US. For example, as if everything boils down to patents (the more, the merrier), Watchtroll has just published "Fixing America’s Patent System is the Best Strategy to Jump-Start our Stalled Economy" (on Monday).

"It has become so bad that the industry is full of trolls -- one of whom (Erich Spangenberg) made about $50 million from one single patent which recently turned out to be invalid."What they mean by "fixing" is the very opposite of fixing. They want to bring rise to more Qualcomm-like parasites.

Yesterday, behind a paywall, the patent microcosm also promoted software patents, as it so habitually does. Heck, who needs the opinion of actual software professionals? We live in a world where journalism about patents is composed by non-scientists who speak to lawyers, not scientists. It has become so bad that the industry is full of trolls -- one of whom (Erich Spangenberg) made about $50 million from one single patent which recently turned out to be invalid. Think of all the companies he robbed by this charalatan over the years.

Recent Techrights' Posts

Banned evidence: Ars Technica forums censored email predicting DebConf23 death, Abraham Raji & Debian cover-up
Reprinted with permission from Daniel Pocock
Intimidation, Threats, and Bullying Not Tolerated by Techrights
When it comes to our reporting, safety always comes first
Something to Celebrate in Gemini Protocol
More capsules and users join in
 
Costa Rica Almost Bankrupt Because of Microsoft
the incidents in Costa Rica are Windows incidents
Gemini Links 29/03/2025: Art of Looking, Wireguard, EMacs
Links for the day
Links 29/03/2025: Attacks on Social Security and War Updates
Links for the day
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Friday, March 28, 2025
IRC logs for Friday, March 28, 2025
A World Without Rules
We're long insisted on better laws and actual enforcement of them (applicable to all, not selectively applied)
IBM's BS (Bait, Switch) Regarding Ways to Stay Onboard
PIPs, RTOs, and forced relocations are just an illusion of choice (or ability to recover)
statCounter Sees Microsoft Windows Falling to New, Unprecedented Lows in Palau
Taking Android into account, Windows is now down to an all-time low of 14%
Google News Lost the Fight to LLM Slop (While Google Itself Sells Slop, Nowadays Under the Name "Gemini")
Many people say that "Google is getting worse"; that's almost an understatement
Links 28/03/2025: AirAsia Trouble Again, UMich Culls All DEI Programs
Links for the day
Gemini Links 28/03/2025: Alexa is for Gullible People, Rant About Feature Overload
Links for the day
The SLAPPs From the Microsoft Strangler (and Sidekick) No Better Than Patent Trolling
one must never settle with trolls
Links 28/03/2025: Last Reminder "to Delete Your 23andMe Data", "UK's First Permanent Facial Recognition Cameras Installed"
Links for the day
Microsoft Canonical Continues Its FUD (Fear, Uncertainty, Doubt) Campaign, Reveals Google Too Sponsored It
They're paid-for lies from a Chinese company that takes GAFAM money to write puff pieces about them
Android Rises Above 76% in Mozambique, Leaving Windows in the Dust
Windows may soon be measured as smaller than Apple's iOS
IBM, Red Hat and Microsoft Probably Also Manipulate Metrics (It Helps Con the Shareholders)
Wall Street's credibility will depend on enforcement of "checks and balances"
Slopwatch: trendhunter.com and Other Pure Junk From "Google News"
The need to vet sources is hardly new; anyone can spew out anything, anywhere. There's a need for vetting.
Gemini Links 28/03/2025: Rewatching The X-Files, Slop Concerns, and NOSTR Censorship
Links for the day
Links 28/03/2025: Australia at Risk, EPO Grants Illegal Patents With Illegal Effect
Links for the day
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Thursday, March 27, 2025
IRC logs for Thursday, March 27, 2025
Links 27/03/2025: Obituary to a Shop, Russia Trying to Buy Time
Links for the day
Links 27/03/2025: Slop, Autosuggestions, and Nostr
Links for the day
Apparently Confirmed: IBM Layoffs in Canada Today, Hundreds Affected
Impacting "177 people", says one person, "in Ottawa"
When Windows Was Dominant (1990s) Browser Monopoly Meant MSIE, But Now Google Android is Dominant and the Web in a 'Webapps' Era Works With (or Is Designed for) Chrome-isms
We've been there before
Slopwatch: BetaNews, LinuxSecurity.com, and the Attack on Web Search Using Fake and Likely Plagiarised Pages
Changing a few words here and there won't change the fact that it's not properly authored
Links 27/03/2025: U.S. Honeybee Deaths Reach Record High, Legal Occupation Next in Line After War on Science
Links for the day
Using Courts for 'Revenge' is Always a Losing Strategy
Trying to cause someone you dislike to spend a lot of money
IBM CFO James Kavanaugh Refers to Firing of Almost 10,000 Americans as "Workforce Rebalancing" (Shifting IBM's Centre of Balance to Low-salary Contracts/Countries)
The scale of IBM layoffs is getting too large to evade WARN Notices
[Video] Dr. Richard Stallman's Keynote Speech in Kerala Finally Uploaded
In non-free format and proprietary YouTube, but perhaps that's better than nothing
Islands Are Leaving Microsoft Behind, According to statCounter
Android has had a very strong year
EPO Management Fails to Deny That the Office is Discriminating Against Women
Europe's second-largest institution isn't just exceedingly corrupt but also immoral
In Some Countries the Market Share of Vista 11 is Going Down, Not Up
despite being released in 2021
Rumour: Mass Layoffs in IBM Canada Today
Maybe later today some people from Canada will say something firmer and maybe some media will even talk about that
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Wednesday, March 26, 2025
IRC logs for Wednesday, March 26, 2025
Gemini Links 27/03/2025: X-Files' "Kill Switch", Orlando, and ASN (Autonomous System Number) 'Hack'
Links for the day