US: Ninth Circuit allows Intel and Ericsson into Qualcomm antitrust suit

Technology company Intel and telecoms firm Ericsson, along with five others, have secured permission from the US Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit to intervene in a class-action suit against Qualcomm.

Earlier this week, the Ninth Circuit granted the emergency motions, allowing Intel and Ericsson, along with Sprint Spectrum, MediaTek, Nokia, Motorola Mobility, and Lenovo, into the claim brought by an estimated 250 million US phone buyers.

These buyers allegedly suffered an antitrust injury, because the cost of inflated patent royalties associated with licensing Qualcomm’s technologies was passed on to them.

The tech and telecoms companies filed the motions so they can ask the court to ensure that their motions, which allegedly contain highly confidential information, remain under seal.

“If Sprint is not allowed to file its motion to seal, non-public highly confidential Sprint business information revealing current and future strategies would be revealed to Sprint’s competitors, causing irreparable harm to Sprint,” stated Sprint’s motion.