In an interview, Apple CEO Tim Cook shared some details about the company’s ongoing legal battle with Qualcomm. Despite rumors of settlement talks, Cook says that Apple has not been in any settlement discussions with Qualcomm since the third calendar quarter of last year. And in response to a question about whether Apple will cave and enter into a settlement with Qualcomm given the import bans in China and Germany, he said “no.”
The two companies are disputing comments: Apple’s chief on Tuesday said any talks ended in September 2018. In November, Qualcomm’s Chief Executive Steve Mollenkopf made comments about the supplier’s efforts to resolve the dispute.
The war of words is unlikely to play a major role in the outcome of the legal fight between the two firms. Subsequently, Apple CEO slammed Qualcomm’s “goose plucking” licensing fee in an interview and accused Qualcomm of hiring people to write fake news to smear apple’s image. Regarding this, A Qualcomm spokesperson said that Cook had made misleading comments.
Apple and Qualcomm have been latched in a legal battle in which Apple has accused Qualcomm of engaging in illegal patent licensing practices to preserve a dominant market position in so-called modem chips, which help mobile phones connect to wireless data networks.
Qualcomm in return has accused Apple of not fairly compensating it for its technical innovations and stealing its trade secrets. Qualcomm has argued that its practices followed decades-long tech industry norms and that Apple has not fairly paid it for its intellectual property.
