Rockstar Consortium to Sell 4,000 Patents to RPX Corp. for $900 Million

In yet another sign that the smartphone-patent wars are starting to cool, Apple and a handful of other big technology companies have agreed to sell the bulk of a jointly owned portfolio of telecommunications patent assets for $900 million, less than a quarter of the $4.5 billion they paid for the full portfolio four years ago.

Rockstar Consortium has agreed to sell more than 4,000 patents to San Francisco-based RPX Corp. , a patent clearinghouse that helps companies protect themselves from patent lawsuits. The deal will put an end to several high-profile lawsuits filed by Rockstar against companies that make phones powered by the Android operating system.

[Dec 24]