European antitrust watchdog closes case against chip maker Qualcomm

European Union anti-trust regulator closed a four-year-old investigation against the US wireless chip maker Qualcomm without levying a fine or absolving it from charges of excessive royalties on technology patents after complaining firms withdrew their complaints.

The European Commission (EC) today said that it had closed formal anti-trust proceedings against Qualcomm after all mobile phone and / or chipsets manufacturers like Ericsson, Nokia, Texas Instruments, Broadcom, NEC and Panasonic, withdrew their complaints or were planning to withdraw them.

"The commission committed time and resources to this investigation in order to assess a complex body of evidence, but has not as yet reached formal conclusions," the EC said in a statement. It added that would not be "appropriate to invest further resources in this case," without complaints against Qualcomm's pricing practices.

Qualcomm, based in San Diego is the world's largest maker of chips that run cell phones and is known for pioneering technologies.

The chip maker is the inventor of CDMA one (IS-95), CDMA 2000, and CDMA 1xEV-DO, which are wireless cellular standards used for communications. The company also owns significant number of key patents on the widely adopted 3G technology, W-CDMA.

With an employee count of 12,800, it had posted revenues of $8.87 billion in 2007-a year when rivals complained to the EC that Qualcomm's licensing terms and conditions are not Fair, Reasonable and Non-Discriminatory ("FRAND") and, therefore, may breach EC competition rules.

Nokia, Broadcom and Erricson have already withdrawn their complaints after reaching settlements with Qualcomm. (See: Qualcomm, Broadcom reach $891 million deal to end lawsuits)