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

To: Ali Chen who wrote (70921)	4/25/2001 6:58:20 PM
From: SBHX	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 93625

So, technically speaking, the true owners of Rambus patents must be the MIPS Technology, University of Illinois, and Stanford University, whichever percentage ownership they may have agreed upon. Funny. They probably are waiting to sue if Rambus manages to shake off some serious money that are worth legal troubles... Unlikely. Universities usually don't own any IP their professors invent in their free time, so Dr Horowitz is probably in the clear. As for MIPS, it depends what employment agreement Mike Farmwald signed with them. Depending on how senior he was in the technical ladder, many companies do put in place very strict 'all invention' clauses in the employment contracts. It also depends if Farmwald just thought of it, or added substantial improvements to the design while employed in MIPS. Other contracts may talk of 'all inventions' related to the business of the company --- in this case memory is very closely related to CPU --- especially one that has a integrated memory controller like some MIPS implementations. A less strict one may talk of 'all inventions' during working hours OR using company equipment. If this is what MIPS has, all MIPS has to prove is that all of Farmwald's computer equipment (laptops, desktops) belonged to MIPS when he was there. Why do you think companies are so anxious to supply PCs for employees? (g) But it's probably not that easy to prove this as all Farmwald has to show is that he has another PC that he used to work on it, or that he only needed cocktail napkins to sketch his ideas (unless the napkins are in the company cafeteria). But then, there may no such clause at all. But that is very unlikely for engineers and inventors. Given the tons of successful startups from employees who left other companies, it is almost impossible to prove this anyway. SbH

To: Ali Chen who wrote (70921)	4/25/2001 7:10:23 PM
From: Zeev Hed	Respond to of 93625

Ali, actually, most institutions allow their professors up to 20% of their time as "free time" in which they can consult or wotk on their own ideas. If they did not, other companies would not hire these as consultants, since they will not have "dibs" on the IP created by these consultants. As long as those guys did not "oscilliscopes" and lab equipment owned by the institutions those institutions will have a hard time proving they have any ownership in the IP. There is also a principle of "reduction to practice" which the institutions will have to show, in porder to claim rights in the IP, for instance, paying for filing the patents might be such showing of "reduction to practice". Zeev