CRI听力:Qualcomm to Pay 975 Million Fine to Settle China Antitrust Case

U.S. chipmaker Qualcomm has agreed to pay a fine of nearly a billion U.S. dollars to Chinese authorities and has agreed to modify its practices.

The National Development and Reform Commission (NDRC) says the U.S. firm was found to have abused its market dominance and to have limited competition.

This ends a 14-month government investigation into the company's practices in the marketplace.

Lu Yanchun is with the Price Supervision and Anti-Monopoly Bureau of NDRC.

"According to law, from the day we issue the formal penalty decision, Qualcomm has to pay the fine within 15 days. Imposing a penalty is only regarded as one of the effective measures to regulate companies' behavior, but it's not the purpose. The investigation into this case shows that China pays high attention to the protection of intellectual property rights and firmly opposes any abuse of IPR and the elimination or limitation of competition. "

The deal also sees the chipmaker making changes to the royalty structure it uses to charge Chinese phone makers for using its chip designs.

Qualcomm is also going to offer 3G and 4G patents to Chinese companies, and will no longer require the bundling of those rights with other patents in its portfolio.

Meanwhile, it's also forced to set its licensing rates similar to the royalties it charges elsewhere in the world.
The company earned about half of its global revenues in China last fiscal year.

For more on this, CRI's Zhao Yang talked with Liu Baocheng, Prof. from the University of International Business and Economics.

Liu Baocheng, Prof. from the University of International Business and Economics, speaking with CRI's Zhao Yang.