The International Trade Commission's (ITC's) decision to ban U.S. imports of some mobile phones that include certain Qualcomm 3G chips will have only a limited impact on the global wireless communications industry in the short term, according to iSuppli. The ITC stated certain Qualcomm chips used in EV-DO and WCDMA mobile phones infringe on a patent held by Broadcom (see: Broadcom takes Qualcomm to court for patent infringment). The move follows an ITC decision that Qualcomm's mobile-phone baseband chips violate a Broadcom Patent that relates generally to power management in wireless handsets.

If upheld, the ban will impact an estimated 4.2 million shipments of EV-DO and WCDMA mobile phones in 2007, according to Tina Teng, analyst, wireless communications, for iSuppli.

This will represent 4.4% of North American mobile-phone shipments in the second half of the year and 3.2% of worldwide 3G mobile-phone shipments during the period. Teng said that only 11 mobile-phone models would be impacted by the ban in 2007, representing 0.9% of new phone model introductions for the year, citing data from iSuppli's Design Forecast Tool.

One product that could be impacted by the ban is Apple's iPhone, which soon will be offered to consumers in the United States. Some of the advanced mobile phones impacted by the ITC ban were expected to compete directly with iPhone.