Qualcomm CEO thinks Apple will settle in latest lawsuit

Last week, the conflict between Qualcomm and Apple escalated to the point where a lawsuit was issued for the banning of all Apple products that use Qualcomm’s patents. According to Qualcomm, Apple refuses to pay patent royalties that are related to performance and battery efficiency. Qualcomm CEO Steve Mollenkopf revealed in a recent Fortune interview that "there's not really anything new going on […] those things tend to get resolved out of court and there's no reason why I wouldn't expect that to be the case here."

Mollenkopf said the billion dollar dispute with Apple is similar to earlier fights Qualcomm has had over the years with other companies, and most of them were settled outside the court. However, Qualcomm’s CEO does not know of any official announcement from Apple – "I don't have an announcement or anything so please don't ask”.

If the whole dispute goes too far, Apple would have to pay all the royalties plus lawyer and court expenses, and since this is a big case, the court fees could end up too high and Apple should clearly respect the contract and resort to settling outside of court.

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