Qualcomm agrees to pay Huawei for patents for the first time
The multi-year cross-licensing deal covers 5G, computing and artificial intelligence, and still needs US regulatory approval
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Huawei and Qualcomm have signed a long-term patent-sharing agreement, reversing the direction of payments between the two companies for the first time, Nikkei Asia reported. Under the deal, announced Monday, Qualcomm will pay Huawei for patents covering 5G and artificial intelligence technologies.
Huawei called it a multi-year, broad patent licence agreement spanning 5G, computing and AI, according to the South China Morning Post. The arrangement includes Qualcomm's purchase of specific Huawei patents held in the US across compute, AI and networking. Huawei said the transaction involves no other business cooperation and remains subject to regulatory approvals. Nikkei Asia reported the deal cannot take effect until it clears US regulators.
The two companies have a history of licensing disputes. In 2020 Huawei agreed to pay Qualcomm $1.8 billion to settle a patent dispute, the Post reported. This time the payment runs the other way. Huawei's chief intellectual property officer, Alan Fan, said the agreement reflects "the value of Huawei's innovations" and recognises Qualcomm's "foundational contributions to modern communication technologies." John Han, an executive at Qualcomm Technology Licensing, said it "reaffirms industry recognition of Qualcomm's 5G technology leadership."
The agreement stands apart from the AI data center story that has driven Qualcomm shares higher this month, since it touches licensing economics in handsets and smartphone chips rather than the Amazon-linked silicon buildout. It also lands against unresolved friction between Washington and Beijing over Huawei, after China's Foreign Ministry objected to US restrictions on the company, making a bilateral commercial arrangement that sidesteps that dispute notable in its own right. Qualcomm already led mega-cap gainers with a 4.8% advance in a recent session on AI-related strength, so this deal gives the stock a second, separate source of support tied to licensing revenue rather than data center demand.