Jonathan Stempel
(Reuters) – Qualcomm (NASDAQ:) agreed to pay $75 million to settle a lawsuit in which shareholders accused the chipmaker of defrauding them by hiding its anticompetitive sales and licensing practices.
A preliminary agreement to pay the money was filed Tuesday in federal court in San Diego.
This requires the approval of U.S. District Judge Jinsuk Ota, who declared the lawsuit a class action in March 2023.
Qualcomm and six individual defendants, including former CEOs Paul Jacobs and Steven Mollenkopf, deny wrongdoing in agreeing to the settlement.
The San Diego-based company did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
Shareholders accused Qualcomm of artificially inflating its share price between February 2012 and January 2017, repeatedly calling chip sales and technology licensing separate businesses when in fact Qualcomm combined them to stifle competition.
In January 2017, the Federal Trade Commission and Apple (NASDAQ:) sued Qualcomm separately over its alleged efforts to monopolize the market for baseband processors, a type of chip used in mobile phones.
Apple said Qualcomm used its monopoly position to inflate chip prices and force onerous and costly terms on technology licenses.
Qualcomm has called the claims unfounded, but its stock price fell 13% in the first full trading day after Apple sued.
The case is being re-examined Qualcomm Inc. Securities Litigation, U.S. District Court, Southern District of California, No. 17-00121.