Maybe it won't be so easy for Intel to get a DDR/SDRAM chip out for the P4...
Sorry if this was already posted..
Warning Signs of Intel-Rambus Legal Strife
By Steven Fyffe, Electronic News
Dec 01, 2000 --- Intel Corp.’s decision to make SDRAM and double data rate (DDR) memory chipsets for the Pentium 4 could put it on a legal collision course with Rambus Inc., which claims to own the rights to crucial parts of the technology.
“If Intel is building a chip which has a memory interface other than a Rambus memory interface, and if that memory interface infringes our patents, then Intel is not licensed to use our patents for that application and that chip,” said Geoff Tate, Rambus’ chief executive officer in a conference call to analysts and investors Thursday.
Memory makers Samsung, Elpida Memory, NEC, Hitachi and Toshiba have already agreed to pay undisclosed royalties to Rambus on SDRAM and DDR chips, as well as any chips that use SDRAM or DDR memory interfaces. Rambus is currently suing Hyundai, Infineon and Micron for refusing to pay up.
Intel recently confirmed it was planning to make a DDR chipset for the P4, in addition to the SDRAM chipset it said would be available with the P4 by the second half of 2001. But Rambus has not granted Intel the right to use its SDRAM and DDR patents, Tate said.
Intel asked to use Rambus’ SDRAM and DDR patents back when it was negotiating a deal to license direct Rambus DRAM (RDRAM), but Rambus held onto the tactical patents, Tate said.
“The agreement with Intel was driven by their desire to license our technology for Rambus-compatible chips,” he said. “At the same time, like many companies, Intel asked for a very broad patent license and we refused to give them such a license for any competitive memory interface technology.
“Our business was memory interface technology, and we were only going to license from our patents to build and sell Rambus-compatible memory interface chips. Nothing that infringed our patents that was competitive with our memory interface technology is licensed to Intel.”
Rambus did give Intel limited rights to use its patents in logic chips that do not include a memory interface, Tate said.
“In the case of logic chips that don’t have any memory interface on them … we did give Intel, as a very unique case … the right to use our patents … on things like, say, front-side buses or other kinds of I/Os, as long as they aren’t memory interfaces,” he said.
Other logic companies do not enjoy the same exempt status. Rambus has already asked several unnamed logic companies to start paying royalties.
“We are negotiation with several companies that are both DRAM companies, and companies that are only logic companies,” Tate said. “We feel in many of those cases that negotiations are progressing quite well.” |
