Why can't Hitachi, Samsung, etc. file lawsuits claiming to have been DEFRAUDED by RAMBus, and (if they win) collect all royalties they paid as compensatory damages (plus interest, of course), plus punitive damages?"
Hey, nothing stopping them. If I wanted to break my contract with RMBS. However, they'd have to show fraud on every applicable patent. Also, they'd have to look at what fraud was exactly committed. It will be interesting to see what transpires on appeal of this account as it is still rather baffling to figure out exactly what fraud was committed. I still haven't quite figured it out myself as to exactly what RMBS did fraudulently. It seems that what the jury most probably grabbed on was Rambus' continuation patents and that they copies SDRAM in that regard.
But here is a take on the situation from Jim Rockwell. I normally wouldn't post it but its been posted all over the web by now in any event:
WHERE'S THE BEEF?
(An opinion by Jim Rockwell)
Help! Help! Would someone tell me, where are the SDRAM patents that Rambus
was secretly applying for while at JEDEC?
Did I miss something? I was at the trial every day and never saw one SDRAM
patent from Rambus other than the ones they applied for in 1998, over two
years after they left JEDEC. Did Desmarais slip one past me when I wasn't
looking? Did Desmarais secretly give it to the judge in the judge's
chambers? Would someone please tell me, WHERE'S THE PATENT?
How on earth did Rambus misbehave while at JEDEC? Could someone please tell
me?
Should Crisp have said, "Stop! Stop! Stop design work on the JEDEC SDRAM
because we have patents on RDRAM!
Should Crisp have lied and said, "Stop! Rambus has an SDRAM patent
application!"
Do you suppose if Crisp had lied back then, and claimed Rambus had an
SDRAM patent or patent application, that Infineon would now be suing Rambus
because Crisp lied?
I saw a patent list on Rambus' JEDEC termination letter, which Desmarais
was showcasing and saying, "Why did Rambus send us this letter with this
list of all their patents? There is NOT one SDRAM patent here! Every
single one is an RDRAM patent!
Thank you, Mr. Desmarais, that is exactly what Rambus has been saying.
So Desmarais even admits that every patent Rambus had at that time was an
RDRAM patent! There was one single RDRAM patent that was accidentally left
off the list and it did contain a claim on Rambus' DLL invention that was
put into DDR years later, but Rambus never asserted that patent against
anyone, ever!
There were hundreds of undisclosed SDRAM patents owned by other JEDEC
members! Rambus never had even one, while at JEDEC! Let's put all the
others on trial, they did wrong by not disclosing, but Rambus never had an
SDRAM patent or patent application to disclose!
Forget all the notes from five years ago that looked as if Rambus was going
to patent SDRAM features, forget the business plan that stated Rambus was
going to patent SDRAM features in the next quarter, forget the attorney's
notes on putting claims on SDRAM, look at what actually happened! Not one
single SDRAM patent was applied for or issued to Rambus, while Rambus was
at JEDEC! Not one!
Years later in 1998, Mr. Steinberg researched Rambus' patents because he
was interested in going to work for them. What he discovered was that the
Rambus inventions were not properly protected by any of Rambus' current
patents!
After Mr. Steinberg went to work for Rambus and started writing claims to
protect Rambus technology, he printed out data sheets from some memory
manufacturers' and discovered that SDRAM and DDR was full of Rambus'
technology! He of course, as is encouraged by US Patent Law design, started
writing claims to properly protect Rambus' inventions that had been used by
Siemens for the joint IBM/Siemens SDRAM development project, which later
was probably turned over to JEDEC for use in the JEDEC SDRAM design. The
patent office agreed with his claims and issued patents in 1999 and 2000,
these are the patents SDRAM infringe.
Crisp was at JEDEC to make contacts and to try to sell its members Rambus
memory licenses. He was actually transferred to the Rambus marketing
department and worked for the V.P. of marketing.
Mr. Crisp was disturbed to notice that some of Rambus' ideas were being
proposed at JEDEC and he did talk to some people about it. He was told it
was only an issue for JEDEC if Rambus had patents or patent applications on
the SDRAM design in question. Crisp could not get JEDEC to stop design work
on SDRAM because he thought all of Rambus' patents were on RDRAM only
(which, as proven by subsequent events, was true).
Crisp had discussions at Rambus, concerning this problem, and a plan was
made to apply for patents on the technology, so that Rambus could prevent
JEDEC from using Rambus technology in SDRAM. The patent attorney was unable
to write the claim in such a way as to make SDRAM infringe, so the claims
were only amended to further protect RDRAM. Rambus wanted to stunt the
growth of competitive products that were using Rambus' own technology to
compete against RDRAM, but they failed to do so as history has proven. If
they had been able to write the claims on SDRAM, they would have stopped
the development of SDRAM, but of course the actual facts are, that not one
Rambus patent or patent application covered SDRAM.
Rambus lost a fortune from their inability to get patents on SDRAM back
then. Rambus could have stopped the JEDEC SDRAM development in its tracks.
The memory manufacturers would have had to license Rambus RDRAMS back in
1994, if they wanted higher speed memory.
It wasn't until Mr. Steinberg, a patent attorney and an electrical engineer
heavily experienced in SDRAM, came a long, long after Rambus had left
JEDEC, that Rambus had someone on board who could properly write the legal
claims to the complex Rambus technology. Don't forget Rambus was, and still
is, a small company. Those new claims were filed in 1998 and 1999, years
after Rambus had left JEDEC!
There was no wrong doing by Rambus. In fact Rambus was probably the only
memory design company at JEDEC who did NOT have an undisclosed patent or
patent application on SDRAM!
As Mr. Desmarais, the Infineon attorney kept asking, "Why didn' t Rambus
tell JEDEC?" Why? Because Rambus had no patents or patent applications on
SDRAM to tell anyone about! Month after month, year after year, Rambus had
no SDRAM patents or patent applications. Month after month, year after
year, Rambus had nothing to disclose. Nothing, month after month, year
after year! Nothing! Nothing!
Did I really miss something at the trial? I sure would like someone to
explain to me "WHERE'S THE PATENT?"
By the way, I would like to know, who, at JEDEC claims to have invented the
Rambus inventions? Mr. Desmarais kept saying during the trial that Rambus
took JEDEC's ideas from 1991 through 1995. Mr. Desmarais never volunteered
exactly who at JEDEC had the ideas. If Rambus did get the ideas from JEDEC,
they must have traveled back through time to 1990 and put them into the
original Rambus patent application where they have been since 1990.
Maybe Rambus should start licensing their time machine technology. I would
advise them to never disclose this technology to a big company under a
non-disclosure agreement. It won't help, and could get them accused of
fraud and racketeering again. |
