Wireless Technologies: Making a Difference

• Author: Donald J. Rosenberg
• Position: Executive Vice President & General Counsel for Qualcomm
• Pages: 12-15

In his role as General

Counsel, Mr. Rosenberg

is responsible for

overseeing Qualcomm’s

worldwide legal aairs

including litigation, IP

and corporate matters.

JUNE 20 11

12

Patent s cre ate opportuni-

ties and drive growth

Found ed in 1985 by seven pe ople in San Die go,

California, Qualcomm began without a specic product

in mind but with the determination to innovate in digital

and wireless communications. That innovation came in

the form of a mobile technology called Code Division

Multiple Access (CDMA) which, at the time, was widely

perceived as promising but risky. To cover the costs of

commercializing CDMA, Qualcomm began licensing

its growing port folio of patents to cellular phone and

equipment manufacturers.

The promise of CDMA technology combined with the

strength of the company’s steadily expanding patent

portfolio, helped drive Qualcomm’s rapid rise from a

startup with a handful of employees to the world’s larg-

est supplier of chips for cell phones. Today, the company

has more than 18,500 employees in 146 oces around

the worl d and annual revenues of US$11 billion. The

bulk of revenues are derived from the sale of chips and

related software, but a sizeable proportion is generated

through royalty-b earing licensing agreements to use

Qualcomm’s inventions.

Innovations and technology advancements in mobile

broadband have enabled the wireless industry to impact

almost every aspect of people’s lives. More than 5 billion

people now own a mobile device and of those, more

than 1.2 billion have a third-generation (3G) -enabled1

device usin g Qualcomm’s patented technology. Th e

mobile phone has b ecome th e larges t inform ation

platform in the history of humankind.

The ability to broadly license the technology worldwide

to more than 190 suppliers of wireless devices, equip-

ment and related sof tware applications and to earn a

reasonable return on investment from licensing the

patents is critical for Qualcomm. The royalty revenues

generated by these activities allow the company to

sustain high levels of investment in research and devel-

opment (R &D) – approx imately 20 pe rcent of globa l

revenues (chip sales and patent licensing combined) –

and drive new innovation. This uninterrupted cycle of

investment in R&D, securing patents for new inventions,

licensing patents and reinvesting revenues has been

called a “virtuous cycle” of risk, innovation and reward.

Qualcomm’s business model – broadly licensing our

technology an d reinvesting in R&D – is enabling the

success of many other companies in the wireless value

chain. As a conse quence, an inc reasing n umber o f

wireless devices and applications with ever-expanding

functionality are commercially available at lower cost.

This makes these cutting-edge technologies and the

services they empower accessible to an ever-growing

number of the global population. The wide diusion

of Qualcomm’s inventions has generated competition

among service providers and device suppliers, enhanc-

ing consumer choice and unleashing new economic

opportunities for down-stream enterprises, as well as

fostering the achievement of social goals, particularly

in price-sensitive developing economies. For example,

India is enjoying some of the lowest prices for 3G service

in the world, at less than 2 euros per month for a 100MB

WIRELESS

TECHNOLOGIES:

Making a Difference

As the w orld le ader in de velo ping ne xt-g enera tion mo bile br oadb and tec hnol ogies , Qualc omm

Incorpo rated has invent ed many of the wirel ess technolog ies at the center of the unprecedent ed growth

in mob ile voice, data and Internet services. The comp any’s tech nologies are integr al to mob ile phones ,

tablets , e-readers, mobile applic ations and oth er wireless de vices and serv ices used by bi llions of peop le

worldwi de. Dona ld J. Rosenberg, Executiv e Vice President & Gene ral Coun sel for Qualcomm, discuss es

the importance of i ntellectual proper ty (IP) to Qu alcomm and how the company is worki ng with local

partners in many countries to foster entrep reneurship and social goals through its Wireless Reach initia tive.

Photo: Qualcomm Inc.

1. 3G – a generation of

standards for mobile

phones an d mobile

telecommuni cations

services fullling the

Internation al Mobile

Telecommuni cations-

2000 (IMT – 2000) sp eci-

cations which include

a range of applicatio n

services such as wide -

area wire less voice t el-

ephone, mo bile Internet

access, v ideo calls a nd

mobile TV , in a mobi le

environment .