LAS VEGAS--SOMA Networks, exhibiting at the Broadband Wireless World conference here, said it has signed an agreement with Qualcomm to license the company's OFDM/OFDMA patents. The move may rankle some who question how important Qualcomm's patents are to future OFDM developments, but SOMA said signing the agreement was a customer-driven decision. Under the terms of the royalty-bearing agreement, Qualcomm, the San Diego innovator that made its fortune from licensing its CDMA patents, has granted SOMA Networks a patent license to develop, manufacture and sell orthongonal frequency division multiplexing/OFDM Access subscriber units, modem cards and infrastructure equipment. Last year, Qualcomm gained intellectual property rights to Flarion Technologies' FLASH OFDM technology through a $600 million acquisition of the fellow San Diego firm. Tom Flak, senior vice president of product strategy at SOMA, said the new patent license covers both FLASH-OFDM technology and OFDM innovations Qualcomm developed on its own prior to that acquisition.

SOMA becomes Qualcomm's first licensee of OFDM/OFDMA intellectual property at a time when most broadband wireless firms are still sizing up how crucial Qualcomm's patents are to OFDM/OFDMA systems. Behind closed doors, several vendors have both disputed and expressed fear about Qualcomm's claims to OFDM intellectual property rights as OFDMA in particular is set to become a core component of Mobile WiMAX systems. It's now clear where SOMA, which has an existing five-year-old licensing agreement with Qualcomm, stands on that issue. Flak said,

"For us, this was driven by our customers. We have a standard now, and we have to make sure for our operator customers that we have [intellectual property] protection. In the end, a lot of IP rights get decided in the court," Flak said. "Other companies can sit around and wonder what will happen, but operators will not make a buying decision when there is uncertainty that surrounds a technology." SOMA CEO Yatish Pathak, added in a statement, "Future-proofing our solution has always been key to protecting our customers' investments, especially given evolving wireless standards. Therefore, as a principal member of the WiMAX Forum, it is crucial that SOMA Networks guarantees our customers that we have rights to key patents essential for OFDMA standards. By expanding our agreement with Qualcomm, we ensure that we have clear rights to use Qualcomm's intellectual property within our recently announced SoftAir FlexMAX solution." Flak said SOMA wasn't concerned whether or not its agreement will force competitors to swing toward or away from a similar agreement with Qualcomm. "Other vendors ultimately will have to make their own decision about this, but we wanted to be out front on this