Court hands TI victory in Qualcomm suit

The Delaware Supreme Court has handed Texas Instruments what could be a final victory in its long-running patent licensing battle with competitor Qualcomm.

Earlier this week, the state Supreme Court said a lower court was correct last year when it threw out a Qualcomm lawsuit alleging TI violated terms of a patent cross-licensing deal for Qualcomm's CDMA (code division multiple access) cell phone technology. Qualcomm had appealed that ruling to the Delaware Supreme Court.

"We are pleased," TI Senior Vice President Joseph Hubach said in a statement. "We believe that this was the correct outcome."

According to TI, the ruling effectively ends all outstanding legal claims involving the patent spat. A Qualcomm representative could not immediately be reached for comment Thursday.

The legal tug-of-war is over a December 2000 patent licensing agreement between the two companies. The 2-year-old patent-licensing agreement gives TI access to Qualcomm's patents for CDMA technology, which powers about 17 percent of the world's cell phones.

In exchange, the Texas company gave Qualcomm access to some of its transistor technology patents.