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Democracy & Technology Blog Qualcomm unfairly targeted for bundling discount?

Hance Haney
October 28, 2005
Broadband

Should it be illegal to offer a discount to a customer who wants to buy a bundled product?
According to Reuters, six firms allege that Qualcomm is stifling competition in the mobile phone chip market by offering preferential terms on patent royalties to manufacturers who also buy Qualcomm’s chipsets. The six firms have filed a complaint with the European Union’s antitrust regulators, who are sympathetic to any argument that competition is a bad thing when undertaken by a large company.
The report makes no mention of whether the preferential terms are alleged to be predatory, or whether the bundling constitutes tying. The question is whether the complaint is just an attack on legitimate economies of scope and scale.

Hance Haney

Director and Senior Fellow of the Technology & Democracy Project
Hance Haney served as Director and Senior Fellow of the Technology & Democracy Project at the Discovery Institute, in Washington, D.C. Haney spent ten years as an aide to former Senator Bob Packwood (OR), and advised him in his capacity as chairman of the Senate Communications Subcommittee during the deliberations leading to the Telecommunications Act of 1996. He subsequently held various positions with the United States Telecom Association and Qwest Communications. He earned a B.A. in history from Willamette University and a J.D. from Lewis and Clark Law School in Portland, Oregon.