Name: Qualcomm CEO Is Staying Confident Through Trying Times
Uploaded: 2017-10-19
Duration: 4 min 51 s
Description: Steve Mollenkopf believes Qualcomm’s investment in the “internet of things” positions them for unlimited potential.

Steve, you've let Qualcomm through so many important technology pivots during a long history. And now comes this huge $ 47 Billion acquisition of NXP semiconductors, you've said this is going to be a game- changer. For Qualcomm, tell us why. The big macro story, is that the road map of cellular is now becoming relevant in a number of other industries, in fact that road map the connectivity, the low power computing all of that is disrupting a number of new industries, large industries, automotive, internet of things, healthcare, education. And what we wanted to do is accelerate Our ability to become the at scale provider of technology into those markets while they were being disrupted. It's obviously a big step in Qualcomm's history but it'll also make us a much easier to deal with partner across all of these new industries that we're excited about servicing. And all of these things you're gonna get because of this new relationship with NXP. A semiconductor. So let me just go back to the auto part of this equation cause all the experts are saying this is going to a huge market. What could it potentially mean for Qualcomm's business? If you look at what's happening in the car today, biggest change is that it's being connect and it's smart. And we're in the early days of, I think, a very long and big change to the automobile as it becomes autonomous, as it becomes all of these things that people talk about. But, the question is, it's easy to bring the computing and the connectivity pieces from cellular, but how are you going to be a good supplier? To the automobile industry cuz it's different. And so one of the ideas was, if we could combine with a very large supplier of technology into all the subsystems of the car, and bring the elements that they perhaps were missing. And they would bring the elements that we would be missing. We could really help the car companies or whomever wants to get into the car business be successful. And I think that this rings true to a lot of folks that we talked to when we've been planning this acquisition. Well Steve this all sounds very exciting for the future but I understand that your NXP deal has been running into some trouble recently in terms of some key shareholders. Wanting you to sweeten up the price. Also, the regulators in Europe are delaying their approval process. What does all of this mean, I mean, what happens next? We haven't seen anything we didn't expect to see so far. If you look it is a big deal. There is a significant footprint around the world, particularly in Europe so you kind of expect to go through. Really all the steps in order to get approval. But I'm sure you've heard that the talk on Wall Street is that you might have to sweeten the deal. Right now, you're offering $ 110 a share. You've stuck with that. The talk is the magic number is $ 130 a share What is it going to take to seal this deal? Yea, it's probably too early to say. It's not unusual, obviously, in a deal of this size, and clearly in a deal in the Netherlands, for there to be those type of discussions, but at this point I think it's too early to talk about anything like that. So Steve, I've got to talk to you a little bit about this law suit with Apple. I know it's a complicated issue, Over patent fees, over licensing fees and what's considered fair on fees and loyalties and who pays what to whom. How do you think it's gonna play out? It probably sounds complicated but in reality is fairly simple. We have a contract, we're trying to defend that contract. When you have an IP business, it can sometimes take a little longer. To do that we have a dispute over pricing, and it'll play out. Clearly a lot of money involved for both companies. But those things get settled sometimes and you have to go to the courtroom steps, and sometimes it happens earlier. It's too early to tell which Which path is gonna converge this time. Well in the mean time Apple has suspended its payments to Qualcomm and this is impacting your financials and we don't know how long this is gonna go on. I mean how long can you afford to have this legal fight continue? Well we're Quite blessed to have cash flow from other sources. Now if you look at the cash flow from the business it continues to be strong. If you look at our ability to raise debt or service debt, or even really our bonds they continue to be stable as well. So I think that's really not the issue for us. The issue is how do we position ourselves to To get through this disputing, get kinda get back to the things that we really love to do let's talk about products. [ BLANK_AUDIO ]

Qualcomm CEO Is Staying Confident Through Trying Times

Leadership

Steve Mollenkopf believes Qualcomm’s investment in the “internet of things” positions them for unlimited potential.