Qualcomm has announced that it reached a resolution with China's National Development and Reform Commission (NDRC) regarding the NDRC's investigation of Qualcomm under China's Anti-Monopoly Law (AML), with the NDRC imposing a fine on Qualcomm of CNY 6.088 billion (approximately US$975 million).

Qualcomm said that although it was disappointed with the ruling it will not contest the fine and the company is pleased to move on in the China market with the support of the NDRC. Derek Aberle, president of Qualcomm commented that the company is pleased that the investigation has concluded and he believes that Qualcomm's licensing business is now well positioned to fully participate in China's rapidly accelerating 3G/4G market.

In addition to the fine, Qualcomm has agreed to implement a rectification plan that modifies certain of its business practices in China.

Qualcomm will offer licenses to its current 3G and 4G essential Chinese patents separately from licenses to its other patents and it will provide patent lists during the negotiation process. If Qualcomm seeks a cross license from a Chinese licensee as part of such offer, it will negotiate with the licensee in good faith and provide fair consideration for such rights.

For licenses of Qualcomm's 3G and 4G essential Chinese patents for branded devices sold for use in China, Qualcomm will charge royalties of 5% for 3G devices (including multimode 3G/4G devices) and 3.5% for 4G devices (including 3-mode LTE-TDD devices) that do not implement CDMA or WCDMA, in each case using a royalty base of 65% of the net selling price of the device.

Qualcomm will give its existing licensees an opportunity to elect to take the new terms for sales of branded devices for use in China as of January 1, 2015.

Qualcomm will also not condition the sale of baseband chips on the chip customer signing a license agreement with terms that the NDRC found to be unreasonable or on the chip customer not challenging unreasonable terms in its license agreement.

However, this does not require Qualcomm to sell chips to any entity that is not a Qualcomm licensee, and does not apply to a chip customer that refuses to report its sales of licensed devices as required by its patent license agreement.