AI-rewritten: This is a summary of an article from Tom’s Hardware, rewritten by AI (Qwen, running locally) to make it easier to read. The facts come from the original article – read it for the full story.

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Qualcomm has announced a historic agreement to pay Huawei for patent rights under a multi-year cross-licensing deal that covers 5G and AI technologies. This reversal marks the first time Qualcomm will pay royalties to Huawei, ending a relationship where Huawei paid Qualcomm for over two decades. The companies previously had ties dating back to 2001 when Huawei licensed CDMA network equipment from Qualcomm. After stopping royalty payments in early 2025, Huawei halted its own payments to Qualcomm in 2018 and took legal action against MediaTek in 2024.

The new deal includes a broad patent license based on fair, reasonable, and non-discriminatory principles, with no other business cooperation or chip sales involved. Additionally, Qualcomm will buy some of Huawei’s U.S. patents outright, though the specific number of patents and value figures were not disclosed. Huawei stated that this agreement brings its total patent-licensing contract value to over $6.9 billion since 2011. Since 2021, Huawei’s licensing income has exceeded what it pays other firms, and as of 2025, the company holds 165,000 active granted patents worldwide.

The patent purchase requires regulatory approval before closing, but no timetable was provided for completion. Qualcomm confirmed the deal will not appear in its upcoming Q4 report because its fiscal year ended prior to the announcement. Meanwhile, Qualcomm renewed its license with Apple effective April 1, 2027. With this agreement, Huawei says it has successfully leveled the playing field, while Qualcomm now pays royalties for the first time since early 2025.