SEOUL – The Supreme Court on Thursday finalized a ruling in favor of the South Korean antitrust regulator's record fine of 1 trillion won (US$760.8 million) imposed in 2016 on U.S. chipmaker Qualcomm Inc. for unfair business practices.
The fine was imposed by the Fair Trade Commission (FTC), which concluded in December 2016 that the San Diego-based company and its two affiliates breached South Korea's competition law by refusing to offer licenses to chipset manufacturers and demanding high fees for patents used by smartphone makers.
The agency had accused Qualcomm of abusing its dominant position in mobile communication markets.
According to the 2016 findings by the FTC, Qualcomm came into owner status of standard essential patent (SEP) rights, deemed essential for mobile phone manufacturing, upon a "FRAND" commitment that requires Qualcomm to provide non-discriminatory service of the patent rights.
But the chipmaker, in practice, either denied companies, such as Samsung or Intel, contracts or restricted their use of the patent rights by limiting sales channels.
The FTC also found Qualcomm abused its dominant position in the modem chipset market to force chipset buyers to purchase its patent rights on terms favorable to itself, consequently ordering the U.S. chipmaker to take corrective measures on 10 accounts.
The top court on Thursday upheld the Seoul High Court's previous ruling that sided with the FTC decision in a suit filed by Qualcomm to reverse the fine.
In its ruling in 2019, the Seoul High Court recognized eight of the 10 corrective measures ordered by the FTC as justifiable.
The appeals court at that time recognized Qualcomm's abuse of its dominant market power in forcing unfavorable business deals on mobile phone makers and unfairly restricting market competition. The 1.03 trillion-won fine marks the biggest financial penalty the FTC has ever imposed so far. (Yonhap)
