Double-whammy for Qualcomm as Nokia wins two rounds

By Scott M. Fulton, III, BetaNews

March 3, 2008, 11:34 AM

Last November, trade courts effectively neutralized many of Nokia's key weapons against Qualcomm in a long-running patent dispute. In the past few days, though, the same courts have deflated Qualcomm's strategy in turn.

In the Nokia / Qualcomm intellectual property dogfight, which originally erupted over a royalties spat, suddenly it's both planes that appear smoking, leaking fuel, and headed into a tailspin. This morning, a High Court judge in the UK has thrown out all of Qualcomm's patent disputes against Nokia, in so doing rendering one of the two Qualcomm patents under examination invalid, reportedly for "lack of novelty."

The move follows just days after the US International Trade Commission opted against reviewing a December decision by its administrative law judge Paul J. Luckern to dismiss three Qualcomm claims against Nokia, and one of Qualcomm's patents along with it. That invention, which deals with a way for a wireless device to detect its own power levels by listening to the feedback on the frequency it's transmitting on, may have been deemed unoriginal ironically on account of an existing patented invention by Qualcomm.

Court proceedings in Delaware on Qualcomm's and Nokia's claims and counter-claims were already stayed pending the outcome of the ITC review decision. That decision, along with the UK's condemnatory follow-up, could be a harbinger of bad tidings for Qualcomm, which now faces the prospects of emerging from this fracas with a nothing / nothing split.

Qualcomm acknowledged the ITC lost last week in almost uncharacteristic fashion, declining this time to spin it into some kind of shrouded victory. However, the company states it's looking forward to July 21, when the crossfire is scheduled to begin once again in Delaware.

Meanwhile, Nokia CFO Rick Simonson told Reuters his company might be doing its customers and partners a better service if they'd just concentrate on getting the Delaware case over with, rather than continuing to fight on all fronts all over the world. "I don't think it has been unduly disruptive," Simonson said of the battle in general, "but everybody in the industry would have benefit [sic] if it wasn't out there, because it adds a degree of uncertainty to investors, operators and customers."