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Strategies & Market Trends : VOLTAIRE'S PORCH-MODERATED -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Voltaire who wrote (10735)	11/1/2000 1:04:11 AM
From: Sully-	Respond to of 65232

NEC-Hitachi may make peace with Rambus Posted : 01 Nov 2000 Early indications suggest that the new DRAM joint venture of Hitachi Ltd and NEC Corp. prefers to make peace, not war, with Rambus Inc. The joint venture, which have unleashed a firestorm of lawsuits in recent months, will independently decide how to come to terms with Rambus' DRAM interface licensing demands. It is slated to open its doors for business on January 1. NEC's decision to license Rambus' broad DRAM interface portfolio may be a prelude to the decision of the still-unnamed NEC-Hitachi joint-venture DRAM company. Under the agreement, NEC has licensed Rambus' SDRAM, double-data-rate and Rambus DRAM interfaces for both logic and memory devices. However, except for next-generation 1,066MHz Direct RDRAM Rambus technology, the licensing agreement will not be transferred to the spin-off. That means the licensing decision will be left to the management team of the new company. Polar opposites NEC and Hitachi, which will each own half of the new company, have stood on opposite ends of the pole over Rambus. NEC's dealings with Rambus date to the early 1990s, when it made the first Rambus-based DRAMs for the Nintendo 64 game console. It was also one of the first suppliers to push 288Mb RDRAMs for high-end systems. NEC's most recent decision to license Rambus' patents for SDRAM and DDR interfaces shows the company is not averse to the licensing model that has generated resistance from many other DRAM makers. Toshiba Corp. and Oki Electric Industry Co. Ltd have also struck similar licensing agreements with Rambus in recent months. Hitachi and Rambus, however, have often been at odds. Hitachi initially declined to pony up royalties for Rambus' SDRAM and DDR interfaces, which prompted Rambus earlier this year to sue Hitachi for patent infringement, and later seek to bar the import of Hitachi-made DRAMs and SDRAM controllers to the United States by filing a complaint with the U.S. International Trade Commission (ITC). Hitachi eventually capitulated and agreed to license and pay royalties to Rambus for SDRAM, RDRAM and DDR interfaces, until the joint-venture company takes control of Hitachi's DRAM operations. Despite the mixed opinions among Hitachi and NEC management over Rambus, early signs indicate that the joint-venture DRAM company will take a conciliatory position with Rambus. The joint venture, which will be headed by Kenji Tokuyama, NEC's former memory division boss, is trying to cast itself as an independent entity eager to get off the ground without a hitch as it aims to nab a 20 percent share of the DRAM market. Asked about the new company's stance on Rambus' royalty and licensing campaign, an NEC spokesman said, "My understanding is that they will probably sign something by the end of the year." The new company "does not want a legal confrontation," he added. "It just wants to get the business established and up and running as smoothly as possible." (Don Green comment...The Japanese way! "Just make it go away" ) Counting on NEC, Hitachi The parent companies also may wish to avoid a repeat of Hitachi's bout with Rambus. Even though the new DRAM company will be an independent operation on paper, it has no fabrication facilities of its own and will rely on NEC and Hitachi for manufacturing capabilities. Any action by Rambus that would try to stop the import of SDRAM or DDR SDRAM into the United States in the absence of an agreement could pose a threat to the parent companies' manufacturing operations. If the joint-venture DRAM company decides to pay the Rambus royalty, it will steer clear of the legal battles that now pit Rambus against DRAM makers Micron, Hyundai and Infineon. After resisting Rambus' attempts to collect royalties on SDRAM and double-data-rate SDRAMs, these chip makers separately filed lawsuits that accuse Rambus of antitrust violations and question the validity of its patent portfolio. Rambus has also been on the warpath, filing lawsuits accusing these DRAM makers of patent violation. — Anthony Cataldo eetasia.com Courtesy of the RMBS food fight thread. Ö¿Ö