“On day two of what was expected to be by far the biggest patent or antitrust lawsuit ever heard, with $30B at stake, the two companies suddenly announced that they had reached a settlement,” Ben Lovejoy writes for 9to5Mac. “The news at first seemed inexplicable.”
“The explanation – or part of it, at least – wasn’t long in coming,” Lovejoy writes. “Just hours later, Intel announced that it was exiting the 5G smartphone modem business.”
“Since Apple was reportedly planning to use Intel’s 5G chips for its 2020 iPhones, that left the Cupertino company without an alternative supplier,” Lovejoy writes. “Clearly things came to a head this week. Either Intel told Apple that it was cancelling the project, or Apple did a progress review and lost confidence. Either way, that left Apple out in the cold without an alternative 5G modem supplier.”
Read more in the full article here.
MacDailyNews Take: Apple is smart to use Qualcomm for the time being and continue to develop modems internally in order to free themselves from Qualcomm’s extortionist morass in the future. Obviously, it would have been smarter to have your own, or an alternate suppliers’, modems in hand before filing a massive lawsuit against the only possible supplier, but perhaps Apple thought they, or Intel, would be further along on 5G modems than they are currently.
SEE ALSO:
Intel axes 5G modem plans after Apple and Qualcomm settle – April 17, 2019
After settlement with Apple, Qualcomm still faces other potential legal fallout – April 16, 2019
Qualcomm and Apple settle, agree to drop all litigation – April 16, 2019
Intel rebuffs report, still plans to supply 5G modems for 2020 devices – April 5, 2019
Intel modem announcement likely means no 5G iPhone until 2020 – February 22, 2019