**Arm Holdings Cancels Qualcomm's License Amid Escalating Dispute**

Arm Holdings plc, the British company known for developing the instruction sets integral to Arm chips, has decided to cancel Qualcomm's technology license, heightening a conflict that has been brewing since late 2022. This move arises from Arm's lawsuit against Qualcomm over its 2021 acquisition of Nuvia, a startup that was meant to bolster Qualcomm's competitiveness with high-performance Arm chips.

Qualcomm received a 60-day notice from Arm, which implies that Qualcomm has until the end of this period to renegotiate terms or face cessation of manufacturing and selling Arm chips. A spokesperson for Qualcomm expressed that Arm Holdings was attempting to "strong-arm a longtime partner," and the company remains "confident that Qualcomm's rights under its agreement with Arm will be affirmed."

The conflict traces back to Qualcomm's purchase of Nuvia, a company founded by former leaders of Apple’s chip design team. Intended to help Qualcomm produce chips to rival those made by Intel, AMD, and Apple's own silicon, the acquisition led to Arm's assertion that it caused Nuvia to breach its existing Arm licenses. Arm demanded that Qualcomm and Nuvia obliterate all pre-acquisition designs, a directive Qualcomm apparently did not follow.

Recently, Qualcomm's latest Snapdragon 8 Elite processor, as well as the Snapdragon X Elite and Plus chips used in Microsoft's latest Surface devices, were powered by the disputed Nuvia designs, dubbed Oryon CPU cores. This switch from Arm’s semi-custom Kryo architecture, which had been in use since 2015, could potentially reduce the revenue Arm garners from its collaboration with Qualcomm. By only licensing the instruction sets rather than incorporating Arm’s own CPU designs into their chips, Qualcomm could lessen Arm’s earnings from this partnership.

As the deadline approaches, the industry watches to see whether a resolution will be reached or if Qualcomm will have to drastically alter its chip production strategy.