"Ericsson has cooperated with the European Commission's four-year investigation to ensure consumers in Europe do not pay higher prices because of Qualcomm's unfair licensing practices" Ericsson's Vice President and Head of General Counsel's Office Nina Macpherson said. "Our goal remains the same: To prevent any patent owner from distorting competition and extorting unreasonable, excessive royalties that reflect neither patent value nor R&D investments in the standards concerned."

In parallel with the investigation by the European Commission, antitrust authorities in other jurisdictions initiated investigations against Qualcomm. As a result, the Korean Fair Trade Commission imposed orders concerning Qualcomm's restrictive practices and imposed the highest fine in its history on Qualcomm. Furthermore, the Japanese Fair Trade Commission ruled that Qualcomm has engaged in licensing practices in breach of antitrust laws, and ordered Qualcomm to cease and desist certain licensing practices, in particular, from extracting inadequately remunerated licenses from its licensees.

Global open standards are greatly beneficial to consumers in that they lead to lower prices, greater competition, interoperability and the development of state-of-the-art technology. Such open standards depend on commitments from all essential patent holders to license their patents on FRAND terms.

Notes to editors:

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Ericsson is the world's leading provider of technology and services to telecom operators. Ericsson is the leader in 2G, 3G and 4G mobile technologies, and provides support for networks with over 1 billion subscribers and has a leading position in managed services. The company's portfolio is comprised of mobile and fixed network infrastructure, telecom services, software, broadband and multimedia solutions for operators, enterprises and the media industry. The Sony Ericsson and ST-Ericsson joint ventures provide consumers with feature-rich personal mobile devices.

Ericsson is advancing its vision of "to be the prime driver in an all-communicating world" through innovation, technology, and sustainable business solutions. Working in 175 countries, more than 75,000 employees generated revenue of SEK 209 billion (USD 32.2 billion) in 2008. Founded in 1876 with the headquarters in Stockholm, Sweden, Ericsson is listed on NASDAQ OMX Stockholm and NASDAQ New York.

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SOURCE: Ericsson

Qualcomm allegedly charged unreasonably high royalties since its patented technology became part of Europe's 3G standard.

The case raised important issues about the pricing of technology after its adoption as part of an industry standard.

The commission said it had committed time and resources to the investigation in order to assess a complex body of evidence, but has not as yet reached formal conclusions.

The decision to drop the investigation was taken after all the companies that initially complained, have now withdrawn or indicated their intention to withdraw their accusations.

"The commission has therefore to decide where best to focus its resources and priorities," it said.

The commission said it is committed to fight against illegal behavior by dominant companies in key innovative sectors like telecoms and IT when an abuse of their market power would deny consumers the benefits of competition and choice.

Ericsson said that its goal remains to ensure a robust, enforceable and fair IPR regime for standards, particularly those relating to 3G and 4G wireless technologies.

In October 2005, Ericsson, Nokia (NYSE:NOK), Broadcom (Nasdaq_NMS:BRCM), Panasonic, NEC and Texas Instruments (NYSE:TXN) had filed coordinated complaints alleging that Qualcomm was both violating antitrust laws and breaching its own commitments to standard-setting bodies to license its declared essential patents on fair, reasonable and non-discriminatory (FRAND) terms.

In support of these complaints, the companies had filed substantial economic evidence that Qualcomm's conduct has caused mobile phone users to pay billions of Euros in unnecessary costs.

In parallel with the investigation by the European Commission, antitrust authorities in other jurisdictions initiated investigations against Qualcomm.

As a result, the Korean Fair Trade Commission imposed orders concerning Qualcomm's restrictive practices and imposed the highest fine in its history on Qualcomm.

Also, the Japanese Fair Trade Commission ruled that Qualcomm has engaged in licensing practices in breach of antitrust laws, and ordered Qualcomm to cease and desist certain licensing practices, in particular, from extracting inadequately remunerated licenses from its licensees.

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