During today's earnings call covering the second fiscal quarter of 2019 (first calendar quarter), Apple CEO Tim Cook was asked about Apple's settlement with Qualcomm.
While Cook declined to provide color on how this will affect Apple's development plans in the future, he did say that Apple is satisfied with the resolution.
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We're glad to put the litigation behind us and all the litigation around the world has been dismissed and settled. We're very happy to have a multi-year supply agreement and we're happy that we have a direct license arrangement with Qualcomm that was important for both companies. We feel good about the resolution.
Apple and Qualcomm reached a settlement in mid-April and agreed to drop all litigation in multiple countries around the world. Apple made a one-time payment to Qualcomm and inked a six-year licensing agreement to use Qualcomm's patented technologies.
The settlement also included a chipset supply agreement, and Qualcomm is expected to provide the 5G chips that Apple will need to introduce 5G connectivity in its 2020 iPhones.
While rumors have suggested Apple is going to add 5G in 2020, Apple itself has not confirmed those plans and Cook did not provide details on Apple's 5G timeline when asked. He did, however, say that Apple aims to get new technologies into products as soon as it can.
We look at a lot of things on the different technologies and try to look at and select the right time that things come together and get those into products as soon as we can.
After Apple and Qualcomm announced their settlement agreement, Intel said that it was dropping out of the smartphone modem chip market entirely, with no plans to manufacture 5G chips.
Top Rated Comments
The royalty rate aside, Apple was able to get what it had wanted - a direct licensing deal and a long-term chip supply agreement. Both of those things were important. Further, it's most likely that Apple didn't have to agree to a number of the onerous terms which it had previously had to agree to. So I'm not sure how this agreement can be seen as anything but a win for Apple.
That doesn't mean it was a loss for Qualcomm though. It's certainly a positive development for Qualcomm because Qualcomm was suffering quite a bit financially from the situation as it was. Any settlement that didn't amount to near complete capitulation (from Qualcomm) should have, I think, been considered a win for Qualcomm. (And I don't think this settlement amounts to a near complete capitulation for Qualcomm, though it surely gave considerable ground). It very much needed this dispute resolved. It's just that there's a new reality now for Qualcomm when it comes to how it can operate. That's in part due to the dispute with Apple (and other industry participants) and in part due to regulatory actions.
[doublepost=1556663449][/doublepost]Are you suggesting that iPhone prices will go up as a result of the Qualcomm - Apple settlement?
If so, why would that happen? If Qualcomm's estimate is close to accurate, Apple will be paying less (per device) in royalties (to Qualcomm) than it would have been before it started withholding them and filed suit.