Court Finds Qualcomm Engaged In Patent Misconduct

A San Diego federal court ruled yesterday that Qualcomm relinquished its rights to enforce certain patents it alleged that Broadcom had infringed on, relating to a high-definition video compression standard. The court found that Qualcomm engaged in standards abuse and aggravated litigation misconduct for deliberately concealing two patents as a committee developed the H.264 video standard. Upon publication of the international standard, Qualcom filed suit against Broadcom for infringing on the two patents in San Diego federal court in October 2005. "The court's findings indicate that this is one of the most serious and egregious cases of standards abuse and litigation misconduct that our industry has ever witnessed," David J. Rosmann, vice president of Intellectual Property litigation, said in a statement. Meanwhile, the Bush administration upheld a U.S. International Trade Commission ban on imported 3G cell phones using Qualcom chips, set to go into effect Tuesday. Qualcomm said it will appeal both decisions.