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Technology Stocks : Rambus (RMBS) - Eagle or Penguin -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Zeev Hed who wrote (44859)	6/18/2000 8:09:00 AM
From: gnuman	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 93625

Zeev, A hypothetical IP issue. Let's examine a hypothetical situation where an IP owner is considering action against two companies. Assume that both companies have shipped very large quantities of infringing product over the past few years. (Assume for example, chip sets). Suppose that to company "A" the IP owner say's, "Either pay me royalties or I will sue." And to company "B" he say's, "If you continue to develop and promote infringing product I will provide you with lucrative stock and patent right's." How do you think the court's would view this hypothetical situation? JMHO's

To: Zeev Hed who wrote (44859)	6/18/2000 9:31:00 AM
From: Scumbria	Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 93625

Zeev, A very simple test for "obvious" is, "if it is so obvious, how come it was not done before". This is certainly a part of the test, but not the complete test. Suppose there was no need for the invention before? Continuing the discussion about the "programmable register for setting delay", EDO memory had no clock, and it would have been meaningless to put a register in the DRAM to count clocks. After the concept of synchronous memory (SDRAM) came up, it was rather obvious that this would be a good way to sort different speed memories. I can't imagine a group of bright digital designers taking more than about 15 minutes to figure that out. L2 caches have been using this same technique for decades now. Do you remember the old days when BIOS settings on PC's allowed you program the first beat latency from the L2? As far as I can tell, Rambus' claim is the same technique, applied to DRAM. But, there was no need for it- until SDRAM. Scumbria

To: Zeev Hed who wrote (44859)	6/18/2000 9:50:00 AM
From: Scumbria	Respond to of 93625

Zeev, maybe the patent office does not have the "talent" you think they need There is no question that the patent office is overloaded, and largely staffed by junior people. Many, many ridiculous patents get through, and these frequently become legal issues later on. BTW, you never responded to my post about the necessity of patent infringement, so I will repeat it again. I would like to hear your thoughts about this. You seem to be taking a very one sided stance on this issue. "There are probably no important semiconductor products that don't infringe on other patents. Some examples are: SGI holds a patent which covers all graphics texture caches. It is impossible to build a graphics chip which does not infringe upon this patent. MIPS holds a patent which covers all misaligned loads and stores. It is nearly impossible to build a CPU which does not infringe upon this patent. STM holds a patent which covers all on-chip processor memory (caches, etc.) It is impossible to build a CPU which does not infringe upon this patent. Most big companies hold large patent portfolios to protect against litigation. DRAM manufacturers are no exception." Rambus presents a particularly difficult situation for the lawyers from other DRAM companies, because Rambus has no product- only IP. It is very difficult to accuse a company that has no product of patent infringement. But I can imagine that rest of the Japanese memory industry is now out for blood from Rambus and Toshiba. These two companies have become a serious problem for some of the largest companies in Japan. Scumbria

To: Zeev Hed who wrote (44859)	6/18/2000 6:08:00 PM
From: Bilow	Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 93625

Hi Zeev Hed; Re: A very simple test for "obvious" is, "if it is so obvious, how come it was not done before". Most of the time, the reason it wasn't done before was simply that the technology to do it did not exist, or there were alternatives that were more satisfactory for technological reasons. The classic case in point was the single chip microprocessor (or was it single chip CPU?). Everybody in industry, not just most people, but essentially everyone, knew that when integration had advanced to a point where it was possible to put a full microprocessor on a chip, then there would be economic reasons for doing this. An inventor (one guy) patented the concept and made a huge amount of money from it. But he never delivered a single working prototype, and the patent he wrote should have been thrown out under the "obvious" classification. At one time, patents probably encouraged innovation, but that was then, this is now. Their primary purpose now is the suppression of competition. Big companies, the ones that actually make products, collect them so as to prevent other big companies from locking them out of a market for their products. This mechanism, the cross licensing of patents, is what has kept our ancient patent mechanism (10 years is essentially infinity for the chip business these days, compare that to the 18th century,) from destroying our ability to ship innovative products. Modern technology requires too many pieces of intellectual property to be analyzed the same way as the patents of the 19th century. When it is possible to make more money writing obvious, general patents, such as the above, then to make money by providing useful, functioning product to customers, we have reduced some of our efficiency as a society. I know that you deal with IP all the time, and that you make money from it. (Though I would guess that the stock market does better for you...) Here's a hypothetical question for you. Suppose a product that you wanted to ship to a customer involved a memory, but that Rambus didn't want you to ship it (for whatever reason), and so insisted on locking you out with their contracts to their licensees. How would you feel about patent rights then? Maybe you'd feel the same way as Hitachi does right now. Hitachi has plenty of IP that if Rambus wins its lawsuit, Hitachi will be unable to use. On the other hand, every RDRAM chip that has ever shipped used Hitachi IP. The worst part about Rambus is that they are forcing an inefficient technology on the market. Adding a 1 or 2% royalty on memory isn't that big of a deal, but there are a lot of other issues. Suppose Intel uses its influence with Rambus to deny AMD (or VIA) the right to make memory controllers that interface with SDRAM? You can always say that this hasn't happened yet, but that isn't the point. The point is where is the limit on the rights of patent holders. Can a patent be used to halt an industry in its tracks? Over the (very) long run, the big technology boom of the last few hundred years will fizzle out, and mankind will return to its ancient and revered mode of living their lives pretty much the way their fathers did. At that time, all patents will have run out, and anybody will be able to make anything. That means that there will no longer be pieces of the patent pie available for distribution by the lawyers. But our society needs to have ways of providing people who are good with words a free ride. My prediction: patent law will return to the ancient royal version, where a patent was the right to make something to the exclusion of everybody else, whether you invented or not. No doubt, people will still be found to support that idea as being fair, right and just (they'll probably mumble something about consumer protection), and they will, no doubt, also be on the receiving end of the largess. -- Carl