I don't think the range is anywhere near that large. The figures provided in the lawsuit that started yesterday stated that Qualcomm controlled 20% of the standards essential LTE patents and were charging Apple $7.50 a phone, and another group that controlled over 40% of the standards essential LTE patents were charging $3.36 a phone. That's where Apple got their argument that they should be paying $1.50.
That $1.50 is the lower bound, not 10 cents - and really the lower bound is higher than that because why would Qualcomm surrender completely to Apple's demands unless they were losing the suit and risked treble damages? Giving in now they got a better deal than that. If the trial was going badly for them they might think that was the outcome and give in then, but not after one day! There's also no chance that Apple would agree to pay the full $7.5 billion - why would they give up on the eve of this huge lawsuit only to accept the deal that has been on the table all the time? They'd only do that if they felt Qualcomm was going to be completely victorious and end up owing nothing, which would also only be apparent after much more than one day of the trial.
The reality is somewhere between the $1.50 and $7.50 figures. Maybe we'll see it in upcoming quarterly reports for Apple or when Qualcomm gets paid by Foxconn et al - Apple has been withholding payments to them and will pay them and then they'll pay Qualcomm. Apple has been keeping a contingency on their books for the full fee, so if they pay less than that it'll show up as a one time item on their earnings. I don't know how Qualcomm has been accounting for it, but it may show up as some sort of an extraordinary one time item though I'll bet they disguise it unless it is very close to the full figure.
Biting the hand that feeds IT
