Jogja Ponsel

Finland’s Nokia and Qualcomm of the U.S. are at odds over royalties over Qualcomm’s code division multiple access (CDMA) technology. The disagreement has drawn attention in Korea not only because it involves the world’s largest handset maker and the owner of the CDMA technology, but also because CDMA royalties directly affect Korean businesses.

Nokia last week announced it would stop negotiating with Japan’s Sanyo to establish a joint venture to strengthen its CDMA business. It cited Qualcomm’s excessive royalties demands, which it said would make it difficult to make profits in emerging markets India and China. Earlier, the Finnish company filed a complaint against the U.S. business with the European Commission for charging excessive royalties. Qualcomm early this month responded with a suit against the mobile phone maker at the U.S. International Trade Commission for six patent violations.

How much Qualcomm asked Nokia to pay is unclear. But Korean cell phone makers pay 5.25 percent of the sales price for domestic handsets and 5.75 percent for export phones. This means Korea has netted Qualcomm more than W3 trillion (US$1=W959) in royalties over the last decade. This is why Korean businesses sympathize with Nokia. “Considering that competition is getting fiercer in the CDMA market, it is time to seek ways for Qualcomm and global handset makers to survive together,” an industry insider says.

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