Arm Files a Lawsuit Against One of its Biggest Customers, Qualcomm

The world of semiconductor IP licensing is complex by nature. If you use a company’s IP, you must agree to its licensing terms. Today, it is precisely those terms that are being breached in the event of Arm Ltd. filing a lawsuit against one of its biggest customers, Qualcomm. When Qualcomm acquired Nuvia Inc., regarded as one of the best CPU design teams in the industry, it transferred Arm-Nuvia license agreements as its own. It continued the development of Arm IP under Qualcomm’s name. This is a standard restriction, as Arm’s licensing prohibits these sorts of IP transfers among companies to protect the IP.

As the UK-headquartered company reports: "Because Qualcomm attempted to transfer Nuvia licenses without Arm’s consent, which is a standard restriction under Arm’s license agreements, Nuvia’s licenses terminated in March 2022. Before and after that date, Arm made multiple good faith efforts to seek a resolution. In contrast, Qualcomm has breached the terms of the Arm license agreement by continuing development under the terminated licenses. Arm was left with no choice other than to bring this claim against Qualcomm and Nuvia to protect our IP, our business, and to ensure customers are able to access valid Arm-based products."