NTT DoCoMo, Samsung, others drop LTE chip alliance
updated 08:55 am EDT, Mon April 2, 2012
NTT DoCoMo and firms don't reach pact in time
In a rare instance of backing off of a major deal, NTT DoCoMo said Monday that it had broken up its planned 4G chip alliance. The Japanese carrier along with Fujitsu, NEC, Panasonic, and Samsung had ended their joint venture in chips after an agreement on exact terms "could not be reached" by the end of the fiscal year, at the end of March. The company NTT DoCoMo had made to get ready for the alliance, Communication Platform Planning Co., was being closed and liquidated as a result.
The exact nature of the dispute wasn't mentioned by the companies involved.
Together, the group was supposed to design LTE and LTE-Advanced chips that they and others could use for smartphones and other mobile devices. The group wouldn't have had its own official factories, although companies that already did, like Samsung, could likely produce their own components.
Without the venture, they will have to turn either to their own inventions directly, such as Samsung's, or buy parts from outsiders like Qualcomm.
