Qualcomm denies the allegations in a second amended consolidated antitrust class action that it acquired or maintained “monopoly power” in the market for smartphone baseband processors, and that its conduct “was lawful, pro-competitive, and based on legitimate business and economic justifications,” said its answer Monday (docket 3:17-md-02773) in U.S. District Court for Northern California in San Francisco. The plaintiffs are four California consumers who allege Qualcomm exploited its position as the dominant global provider of modem chips, and allege the costs of its unlawful conduct were then passed on to consumers via inflated smartphone prices. Qualcomm also denies it entered into illegal tying agreements “that unreasonably restrained trade,” said its answer. The plaintiffs aren’t entitled to injunctive relief “on conduct that occurred solely in the past,” it said. Theirs “are not properly maintainable as a class action,” because the plaintiffs and members of the proposed class “waived such treatment in agreeing to binding individual arbitration,” it said.
Hearst promotes Hearst Television President Jordan Wertlieb to Hearst corporate executive vice president-chief operating officer, effective May 1, succeeding Mark Aldam, stepping down but remaining executive vice president to help with transition until Nov. 1, then becoming executive at large and special adviser to the CEO; Michael Hayes, Hearst Television chief operating officer, succeeding Wertlieb as Hearst senior vice president and Hearst Television president … Enterprise telecommunications company GeoLinks names Verizon’s Hannah Shahriyari director-sales ... Neil Hendin, Google hardware engineering manager-ChromeOS hardware team, named to represent Google on MIPI Alliance board as new promoter member ... Digital advertising platform Smartly.io hires Snap’s Brett Wein, also ex-Facebook, as chief sales officer ... Internet intelligence company DomainTools adds Chad Bacher, ex-Webroot and Malwarebytes, as chief product officer ... InQuest, file detection and response company, names former Meta security engineer Darren Spruell chief intelligence officer ... Axiad, passwordless orchestration company, taps Anomali’s Jon Skoglund as chief financial officer, replacing Thomas Jahn, retiring.
Intel names Darwin Capital managing member Frank Yeary new independent chair, following decision of Omar Ishrak to step down as chair but remain on the board as an independent director ... Paychex adds Theresa Payton, former White House chief information officer under President George W. Bush, to its board, expanding it to 12 members ... Americano Media adds former Rep. Mayra Flores, R-N.M., as senior political contributor ... Moving iMage Technologies names William Greene interim chief financial officer ... Self-service ticketing platform Eventbrite hires Ted Dworkin from Sonos as chief product officer ... Entegris, supplier of advanced materials for semiconductors, says Executive Vice President-CFO Greg Graves plans to retire this year; Graves will remain CFO until his successor is named and through a transition period ... YR Media names Demetria Huntsman, ex-Raheem, chief operating officer ... Twilio promotes Adam Jorde to head-government affairs, managing congressional relationships and leading congressional advocacy ... Ann Lewnes retires as Adobe chief marketing officer and executive vice president-corporate strategy and development ... CTIA announces Slayton Stewart, Carolina West Wireless CEO, as board chairman; Neville Ray, T-Mobile USA president-technology, as vice chairman; and Cindy Christy, president of Asurion president, as treasurer …
U.S. District Judge Jacqueline Scott Corley for Northern California in San Francisco scheduled a further case management conference Feb. 23 on the surviving portions of the June 10 second amended complaint brought against Qualcomm by four California consumers. The original litigation dates back six years to when the FTC and a group of consumers brought similar, parallel actions alleging Qualcomm uses its position at the confluence between chip manufacturing and patent licensing to stifle competition.
Comcast promotes Jason Armstrong to chief financial officer, succeeding Mike Cavanagh, who became president in October ... WWE founder and controlling shareholder Vince McMahon announces his return to the board and his removal of JoEllen Lyons Dillon, Jeffrey Speed and Alan Wexler as directors; McMahon also restores the board seats of George Barrios and Michelle Wilson ... Infrastructure consulting firm TYLin names WSP’s Stephen Cayea chief information officer ... Fund administrator Vector promotes Chief Operating Officer Molly Yakubian to managing partner ... Incompas promotes Chief Advocate-General Counsel Angie Kronenberg to president; Chip Pickering remains president … Supply chain technology company Flexport names Teresa Carlsone, ex-Microsoft and Amazon, president-chief commercial officer.
U.S. District Judge Maryellen Noreika for Delaware signed a scheduling order Monday (docket 1:22-cv-01146) directing plaintiff Arm and defendant Qualcomm to submit by Jan. 13 their initial disclosures to begin fact discovery in Arm’s Aug. 31 breach of contract and trademark infringement complaint against Qualcomm and Qualcomm's Oct. 26 countersuit against Arm. The schedule sets fact discovery to be completed by October 2023, but a five-day jury trial is not to begin until Sept. 23, 2024.
Former FCC Media Bureau Deputy Chief Michelle Carey joins Charter Communications as vice president-policy … Unisys elects former John Wiley & Sons Chief Financial Officer John Kritzmacher to its board ... Smadex, Entravision’s brand advertising platform, names Liftoff’s Phil Gontier, also ex-Twitter, chief revenue officer ... News Corp appoints Emma Tucker from The Sunday Times next editor-in-chief of the Wall Street Journal and Dow Jones Newswires, effective Feb. 1, succeeding Matt Murray, who will take on new projects in a senior role at News Corp, effective March 1, reporting to CEO Robert Thomson ... New York Times Executive Vice President-CFO Roland Caputo plans to retire in 2023, will remain in the role until successor is identified ... St. Joseph Communications’ Duncan Clark returns to Postmedia Network as chief content officer, effective Jan. 16 ... Davis+Gilbert promotes Andrew Edelen, Paavana Kumar, Samantha Rothaus and Lisa Segal-Bloom to partners, effective Jan. 1 ... Yield Engineering Systems, manufacturer of process equipment for semiconductor advanced packaging, names Yee Ching Wong, ex-Veeco, vice president-business development, Asia Pacific ... Enablement platform Seismic adds former CrowdStrike Chief Marketing Officer Johanna Flower to its board ... Marketing communications agency The Bliss Group names Eastend Marketing’s Melissa Stone vice president-head of digital media.
Global Semiconductor Alliance names Marvell Technology CEO Matt Murphy its new chair ... Contract manufacturer Sanmina adds Bramshill Investments Chief Strategy Officer David Hedley to its board ... Digital marketing agency Envisionit names Planck’s Sarah Caputo, also former Allstate, chief operations officer ... IoT platform LocatorX names Chris Janko, ex-Celonis, senior vice president-sales ... Collaborative commerce platform Innoviti Technologies hires Debashree Basu, former Intel head-corporate communications for India and South Asia, as senior vice president-marketing and communications, Innoviti India ... Haivision Systems names Synamedia’s Jean-Marc Racine chief product officer effective Jan. 2 ... Helios Technologies taps Welbilt’s Lee Wichlacz as president-electronics, newly created position ... World Film Industry Conference elects Haige Wang as chairman for a four-year term; Wang, a representative of Macau and chairman of the Aollywood Film Workers Association, is the first Chinese representative elected as conference chairman.
Netlist seeks an order to compel Advanced Micro Devices to produce documents under subpoena that are key to its underlying patent infringement lawsuit against Samsung Electronics and Samsung Semiconductor over various memory devices, said its Dec. 6 motion to compel in U.S. District Court for Western Texas in Austin. Samsung “has repeatedly represented to Netlist” that technical information about several components “is solely within the possession of other parties, including Samsung’s suppliers and makers of servers or server components that support Samsung’s accused products,” AMD among them, it said. AMD claims it can’t comply with the subpoena because the requested documents supposedly contain confidential information of Synopsys, "which hasn't given its consent for AMD to make such production,” it said. Synopsys “has provided no justification for its unreasonable denial of consent,” it said. “AMD has indicated it will not produce the documents in the absence of a court order.”
Sinclair promotes Scott Shapiro to executive vice president-corporate development and strategy ... Alpha and Omega Semiconductor promotes President Stephen Chang to CEO, effective March 1, when current Chairman-CEO Mike Chang becomes executive chairman ... Diebold Nixdorf advances Ilhami Cantadurucu to executive vice president-global retail, effective Jan. 1, replacing Hermann Wimmer, leaving ... Zoomd Technologies names Ido Almany, ex-American Express, CEO to succeed Ofer Eitan, who previously announced he was stepping down, but will remain a board member ... Zebra Technologies promotes Chief Product and Solutions Officer Bill Burns to CEO and adds him to its board, effective March 1, when current CEO Anders Gustafsson becomes executive chair ... Newly appointed to QualTek board: former Lucent and Global Crossing CFO John Kritzmacher; Brightstar Capital Partners’ Bruce Roberson; and ProTrans Holdings CFO and Chief Human Resources Officer Cielo Hernandez; they replace former board members Jigisha Desai, Sam Totusek and Sam Chawla ... Data protection company Veeam names Gigamon’s Larissa Crandall vice president-global channel and alliances ... ACA Connects promotes Brian Hurley to chief regulatory counsel.