A Delaware jury has found that Arm breached its Architecture License Agreement (ALA) with Qualcomm, but the award is about as small as it gets. Reuters reports that Qualcomm gets just $2 in nominal damages, $1 for each of the two claims it won. The jury agreed that Arm withheld software patches and verification tools Qualcomm needed to validate its custom Oryon CPU cores, and that Arm intentionally interfered with Qualcomm's business with Meta. That second claim ties back to October 2024, when Arm's 60-day notice to cancel Qualcomm's license ended up with Bloomberg, a leak Qualcomm pinned on Arm. Arm won the rest of the claims, most of which were about pricing under its separate Technology License Agreement (TLA).
The bigger question, however, is still open. Judge Maryellen Noreika has yet to decide whether Arm's breach lets Qualcomm stop paying royalties under the ALA for five years, which, by some estimates, could be worth billions of dollars. Arm argues that provision is an unenforceable penalty. Unsurprisingly, both sides are spinning the result in their favor, with Qualcomm saying it was "gratified" by the verdict and Arm pointing out that it won most of the claims. This is the second round between the two companies. In December 2024, a jury found that Qualcomm didn't breach its license by acquiring Nuvia, and the court entered a final judgment in Qualcomm's favor in September 2025. Arm has since appealed that ruling, and it's reasonable to expect an appeal here too, depending on how the royalty question goes.
