Qualcomm will pay Huawei to license its patents for the first time in historic turnaround
Qualcomm will pay Huawei for patent rights under a multi-year cross-licensing agreement that highlights both 5G and AI technologies, and will buy some of Huawei's U.S. patents outright, the firm announced. The joint announcement comes 25 years after Huawei began to pay Qualcomm for patents, a reversal that reportedly has Qualcomm paying for the first time. The agreement also covers compute and networking patents, and the patent purchase will close once it receives regulatory approval.
The two companies' licensing ties date back to 2001, when Huawei, then a Chinese telecom-infrastructure supplier, took a royalty-bearing license to build CDMA network equipment. Qualcomm, which once supplied chips for some Huawei phones, stopped counting royalties from Huawei in its revenue in early 2025.
The broad patent license agreement" allows cross licenses" and reflects both companies' commitment to intellectual property rights and to licensing consistent with fair, reasonable and non-discriminatory (FRAND) principles." The deal involves no other business cooperation, Huawei said, according to SCMP; this implies no chip sales are involved. The deal follows a settled back royalty dispute in 2020, the U.S. revoking Qualcomm's license to sell some hardware to Huawei in 2024, and the expiration of Huawei's license by early 2025.
Qualcomm's patent purchase covers compute, AI, networking, and other technologies," according to the announcement, but the number of patents was not disclosed, nor was any value figure. Each company credits the other's portfolio. This suggests that the two are trading official recognition of each other's patents.
Huawei says that, with the Qualcomm deal, the total value of its patent-licensing contracts will top $6.9 billion, counting from its first licensing income from Motorola in 2011. Since 2021, it says, its licensing business has brought in more than the company pays for other firms' patents. In August, the company signed a multi-year Wi-Fi patent cross-license with HP and, as of 2025, the company held 165,000 active granted patents worldwide.
Huawei has also gone to court to enforce its patents, as in a 2024 lawsuit against MediaTek. It halted royalty payments to Qualcomm in 2018, and its general counsel testified for the FTC about Qualcomm's licensing terms in the agency's 2019 antitrust trial against the chipmaker. Huawei can now take some satisfaction in leveling the playing field with Qualcomm.
No timetable has been given for closing the patent purchase. Qualcomm's Q4 report is expected next month, but its fiscal year ended before the announcement, so the deal will not make it into those numbers. The company also renewed its Apple license last month, effective April 1, 2027, after the current extension ends. Qualcomm's relationship with Huawei is now on the other side, as Qualcomm reportedly becomes the one that pays.