So I was reading this article about how Huawei is going to license out it's 5G patents. I thought, "okay whatever, every major company in that space does it." But see that is when it dawned on me; Why nobody innovates anymore.

Let's get history out of the way. Here in the United States (which is a huge market for high end phones) under the Trump administration the US basically blocked any US company from using or selling to Huawei. It effectively cut Huawei out from the US market. We won't get into the political aspects of it because it doesn't matter for this article. Huawei of course fought the decisions laid down by the US government and fast forward a year and they pretty much loss the battle.

So what does Huawei do going forward? Well if it can't make and sell it's own phones, and it can't make and sell it's own parts to be sold to phone manufactures well then the only option left is to license out it's patents.

Huawai has stated that they plan to charge phone makers a big royalty which is capped at $2.50 per phone so they can use their whole collection of patents. $2.50 might not sound like a lot. But lets put that into perspective. From April to June in 2020 Apple sold 15 million iPhones. Let us for this example assume all 15 million iPhones use Huawei 5G patents (which they didn't maybe the same time frame in 2021 they will). That is $2.50 times 15 million. That is $37.5 million in 1 quarter. Take that number and multiple by 4 (4 quarters in a year). That is $150 million a year. One hundred and 50 million dollars every year just from Apple phones. Then you have Google, OnePlus, LG, Sony, Motorola, extra. Sure not all of them will use all of Huawei's patents and pay the $2.50 per phone.

Now for some more history in regards to Huawei. In the past they were known for not litigating its competitors who infringe on their patents, or even license out it's portfolio of patents. But because the United States shut them out they are not estimated they will make $1.3 billion in revenue from 2019 to the end of the year 2021. Just pure profit guys. That is bonkers.

But what reading up on all this made me realize is something else. I always wondered why companies started to not innovate on their phones anymore. The mobile phone game 10 years ago was fun to watch. Companies would come out with new and crazy things with their phones.

I had an HTC Evo Shift 4G and I loved it.

You remember the LG V20? I do and I loved it!

Not all of the stupid things phone manufactures added were great. But at least they were trying to innovate. But I see why it has stopped. Because behind closed doors all the major players stopped 'wasting' money on R&D for phones that may not sell well. They make and sell the phones that sell like hotcakes and then they license the shit out of their patents.

It's annoying that this is where we are at now but at least I see it for what it is now. I want that new phone that isn't a stupid price of over $1,000 that has a cool new feature!