For a moment there, it looked like Qualcomm would have to stop forcing phone makers to pay an additional licensing fee for its patents in order to get shipments of modem and processor chips for their gadgets — as a US judge ruled that “no-license, no chips” practice was anti-competitive in May 2019. But today, the Ninth Circuit threw out that verdict entirely, giving Qualcomm a huge win just as we’re entering the 5G cellular era.

According to the ruling (you can see the most important bits in the tweet below), Judge Callahan disagreed with the Federal Trade Commission’s core argument that Qualcomm was pushing out rival chipmakers by effectively adding a tax whenever phone makers bought rival chips, forcing them to pay royalties for…

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