Taiwan-headquartered fabless semiconductor company MediaTek Inc. and the U.S. wireless communication technology developer Qualcomm have signed a patent cross-licensing agreement.

The patent cross-licensing agreement reportedly covers CDMA and WCDMA patents. Under the agreement, MediaTek and Qualcomm will not need to pay royalties or upfront fees to each other for the designated patents, said Mingto Yu, chief financial officer of MediaTek.

The two companies did not reveal further information about the agreement. However, Yu said because the agreement is only between the two companies, MediaTek and Qualcomm's customers who want to receive rights to the other company's patents need to obtain a separate license.

Qualcomm has a number of CDMA and WCDMA patents and the company makes billions of dollars from these patents each year. During the latest quarter, Qualcomm's patent revenue reached USD837 million.