This week, the U.S. Department of Commerce and ZTE reached a new settlement agreement which will see the Chinese company pay up to $1 Billion for its current fine and $2.29 Billion in total (i.e. including its $829 Million 2017 fine and $400 Million kept in escrow). Although ZTE is paying a huge fine, reports have it that the company can still return to normal operations and avoid further losses.
According to Reuters, Qualcomm CEO Steven Mollenkopf said at a meeting in New York on Thursday that he hopes that the US Department of Commerce and ZTE’s settlement will benefit Qualcomm’s anti-monopoly review of the NXP case in China. Qualcomm had already reached a deal with NXP as early as the end of 2016. At present, the regulatory review is only a matter of “passing over” China. “I hope it means something good to us, but we are really focused more on our individual application,” Mollenkopf told The Deal’s annual corporate governance conference in New York.
Gizchina News of the week
Of course, there is an external factor in the multiple extension of the deal. This is the “malicious” acquisition of Qualcomm launched by Broadcom last year. The latter had to use the transaction with NXP as a defensive measure. According to the report, NXP could opt for Qualcomm’s “dragging” reason, but in the current favorable situation, they may still not intend to do so.
