Section 2 Mangled: FTC v. Qualcomm on the Duty to Deal, Price Squeezes, and Exclusive Dealing

Abstract

Judge Koh handed down a sweeping opinion in May 2019 condemning as antitrust violations many of Qualcomm’s business practices related to the royalty rates it charged to license its SEPs. The district court opinion significantly expands the scope of liability for refusals to deal and for non-predatory pricing behavior, further eroding the longstanding symmetrical approach to antitrust enforcement regardless of the kind of property involved. We find three glaring errors in the district court opinion. First, the court expands the exception to the general rule permitting refusals to deal, as laid out in Aspen Skiing, well beyond the outer boundary of Section 2 by applying it to contracts negotiated by Qualcomm over 20 years ago and by inferring the company was willing to sacrifice profits even in the face of evidence that the change in dealing was implemented to increase short-term profits. Second, the district court accepted a price squeeze theory—characterized by the FTC as a “tax” on OEMs transacting with Qualcomm’s rivals—directly contrary to the Supreme Court’s holding in linkLine. Third, the court erroneously concluded that Qualcomm’s exclusive dealing arrangements with Apple violate the Sherman Act, despite a glaring failure by the FTC to prove substantial foreclosure, contrary to modern antitrust precedent and economic theory, both of which make crystal clear that proof of substantial foreclosure is necessary to showing an anticompetitive effect from exclusive dealing. The district court’s inappropriate extension of antitrust liability in three separate areas of well-settled antitrust doctrine is remarkable and threatens to upend important precedent that has successfully guided business conduct for years. Further, the remedy—aside from putting the nation’s security at risk and potentially undermining U.S. leadership in 5G technology and standard-setting—transforms the role of antitrust courts from adjudicators to central planners, a role for which the Trinko Court expressly stated they are ill suited. The decision invites plaintiffs to use the Sherman Act to reach conduct that has been generally shielded from antitrust liability. That invitation is ill advised and should be rejected by the Ninth Circuit, and if necessary, the Supreme Court.