Intel announces the sale of the "majority" of its smartphone modem business is now complete-- a deal Reuters reports was done at a "multi-billion dollar loss," despite a $1 billion pricetag.

First confirmed back in July 2019, the acquisition brings a slew of mobile modem technology to the Apple fold. As a result, the iPhone maker will be able to create such iDevice components in-house, rather than depend on the likes of Qualcomm. The deal only covers smartphone modems, and Intel is still able to make modems for PCs, IoT devices and autonomous vehicles.

But why did Intel offload the smartphone modem business? A brief filed with the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals has a couple of clues. According to the filing, Intel was forced out of the smartphone modem market by... Qualcomm. Intel claims Qualcom "strangled competition" through possibly unfair patent licensing practices, leading to "artificial and insurmountable barriers" not even the biggest PC chipmaker in the world could, well, surmount.

Qualcomm, of course, denies such accusations as it urges the appeals court to pause enforcement of the ruling against it. Then again Qualcomm is a "trusted" supplier of 5G technology for the Pentagon and Department of Energy, as as such is "impossible to replace" if put out of business by legal wrangling.

Go Intel Completes Sale of Smartphone Modem Business to Apple

Go Intel Says Qualcomm Tactics Forced it Out of Modem Chip Market