U.S. Judge Rules Qualcomm Owes Apple Nearly $1 Billion Rebate Payment
Reuters is reporting that a U.S. federal judge has issued a preliminary ruling that Qualcomm Inc. owes Apple Inc. nearly $1 billion in patent royalty rebate payments, though the decision is unlikely to result in Qualcomm writing a check to Apple because of other developments in the dispute.
Reuters’ Stephen Nellis writes that a district judge in California ruled Thursday that Qualcomm must make the rebate payments to Apple, which for years used Qualcomm’s modem chips to connect iPhones to wireless data networks.
“In general, the contract factories that built Apple’s iPhones would pay Qualcomm billions of dollars per year for the use of Qualcomm’s patented technology in iPhones, a cost that Apple would reimburse the contract factories for,” according to the article.