Qualcomm has agreed to pay Blackberry US$814.9 million for overcharging patent royalties. Blackberry entered into arbitration with Qualcomm over claims it was being forced to pay too much to use the company’s patent protected technologies in its smartphones, which sounds exactly like Apple’s current lawsuit against Qualcomm.
Blackberry said Qualcomm agreed to pay $814,868,350, along with attorney fees. The two companies have been in arbitration for about a year. The companies also struck a deal on capping patent licensing fees.
Apple and Qualcomm apparently couldn’t find a similar way to resolve their dispute over royalty payments. Apple says Qualcomm has been overcharging for patent licensing, and right now it looks like both sides are digging in their heels for a long courtroom fight.
Now that Qualcomm has agreed to pay Blackberry nearly $815 million, and to cap royalty payments, Apple’s legal team will no doubt find a way to use that to its benefit in court. The argument will probably be along the lines of, “Qualcomm essentially admitted it was overcharging Blackberry, so it’s reasonable to assume they’re over charging us, too.”
Apple is essentially accusing Qualcomm of abusing its position as the holder of industry critical patents.
Blackberry and Qualcomm will be back in court on May 30th, 2017, to get the final payout total.
I think that will bring Blackberry’s income for this year up to about…$814,868,350,