Qualcomm filed a breach of contract lawsuit late Tuesday against four Taiwanese contract manufacturers that build iPhones and iPads for Apple — the latest salvo in an escalating war between two tech giants over patent royalties.
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Qualcomm’s court action is in response to Apple’s steps last month to block its contract manufacturers from paying Qualcomm for use of its cellular patents in iPhones and iPads.
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Apple is definitely behind this, and certainly what the contract manufacturers would say is the reason they are not paying, said Don Rosenberg, Qualcomm’s general counsel. Our response to that is you are big, sophisticated companies. You have contractual obligations. You have license agreements with us that don’t involve Apple. You are responsible for paying that.
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The lawsuit falls short of more drastic moves that media outlets speculated Qualcomm would pursue against Apple — including seeking to ban imports of iPhones and iPads into the U.S.
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Last week, Bloomberg reported Qualcomm would ask the U.S. International Trade Commission to issue an injunction prohibiting iPhone imports, citing sources familiar with the company’s plans. The story was widely repeated.
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Rosenberg declined to comment on why Qualcomm chose a lawsuit in San Diego Federal Court against Apple’s contract manufacturers rather than going to the U.S. International Trade Commission to bar iPhone imports.
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We don’t like suing our licensees, said Rosenberg, noting that in the past decade the company has brought just one patent infringement case against a smartphone maker. And we won’t unless we are really put in a corner and forced to do that, and we are forced to do that here.
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The lawsuit names iPhone/iPad assemblers Hon Hai Precision Industry Co. Ltd., known as Foxconn: Pegatron Corp.; Wistron Corp.; and Compal Electronics — all based in Taiwan but with manufacturing operations in China and elsewhere.
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All have long-standing patent license agreements with Qualcomm and…