SAN FRANCISCO — Broadcom and Qualcomm had little use for peace in their huge patent fight over the past four years. But when two new legal chiefs took over at the Southern California chip rivals, something changed.
Broadcom’s Arthur Chong, hired in November, and Qualcomm’s Donald Rosenberg, who’d been hired in 2007 after that company’s aggressive litigation strategy suffered a series of setbacks, began talking in January, Chong said. The result of those talks: The companies announced Sunday night that Qualcomm will pay Broadcom $891 million over four years as part of an agreement to end several patent and antitrust cases against each other.
