Arm Holdings Plc is canceling a license that allowed longtime partner Qualcomm Inc. to use Arm intellectual property to design chips, escalating a legal dispute over vital smartphone technology.Arm, based in the UK,

Any company that makes Arm chips must license technology from Arm Holdings plc, the British company that develops the instruction set. Companies can license the instruction set and create their own CPU designs or license one of Arm's ready-made Cortex CPU core designs to incorporate into their own chips.

Arm Holdings is cancelling an architectural license agreement that allows Qualcomm to use intellectual property to design chips, Bloomberg News reported on Tuesday, amid an ongoing legal battle between the two companies.