Chip technology firm Arm, which is owned by SoftBank Group Corp., has sued Qualcomm and Qualcomm’s recently acquired chip design firm Nuvia for breach of license agreements and trademark infringement.
Arm is seeking an injunction that would require Qualcomm to destroy designs developed under Nuvia’s license agreements with Arm. Arm alleged that they needed Qualcomm’s approval before transferring it.
Qualcomm, which acquired Nuvia for $1.4 billion, said Arm has no right to interfere with Qualcomm’s or NUVIA’s innovations.
“Arm’s complaint ignores the fact that Qualcomm has broad, well-established license rights covering custom-designed CPUs, and we believe those rights will be upheld, Ann Chaplin, Qualcomm’s general counsel, said in a statement.
If Arm’s bid is successful, it would essentially unlock one of Qualcomm’s biggest strategic acquisitions in recent years.
Qualcomm bought Nivea, founded by former Apple chip architects, to restart efforts to create custom computing cores that differ from the standard ARM designs used by rivals such as Taiwanese chip designer MediaTek. shall be.