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

To: Don Green who wrote (71959)	5/4/2001 7:17:53 PM
From: Don Green	Respond to of 93625

High-tech patent case takes shape Companies view same material quite differently BY MCGREGOR MCCANCE TIMES-DISPATCH STAFF WRITER May 04, 2001 Mounds of documentation and piles of testimony have turned to clay in a high-tech patent case unfolding in Richmond federal court. With few clear-cut or undisputed examples to back their cases, lawyers for Infineon Technologies AG and Rambus Inc. spend hours molding their allega- tions out of the same basic material. This is the shape of infringement, Rambus tells the jury. This is the shape of fraud, Infineon counters. Testimony continues today in the case in which hundreds of millions are at stake for each company. U.S. District Judge Robert Payne could soon add some concrete to the mix. The judge will decide whether Rambus has presented enough evidence to allow three remaining patent-infringement claims against Infineon to proceed to the jury. Or Payne could toss the claims out as early as today. Lots at stake According to industry estimates presented at the trial, nine of every 10 computer memory chips sold today would be subject to Rambus royalties if the firm's patents are found to be valid and enforceable. The suit already was narrowed from 57 original infringement claims involving four Rambus patents to just three claims on two patents relating to designs of memory chips. Rambus supporters point out that, despite the slimmed-down case, the company needs just one successful infringement claim to validate patents disputed in the trial. Each company operates in the cutthroat memory industry. Rambus designs memory chips, collecting royalties when other companies sign agreements to produce its patented designs. A worldwide manufacturer Infineon manufactures chips worldwide. Its sole U.S. chip factory is a 2,000-employee plant in Henrico County. The infringement claims are just one part of the trial. As determined as Rambus is to prove patent infringement, Infineon is determined to render those same patents bogus. This week Infineon attempted to show that Rambus hid certain patent applications from an industry organization that was developing standards for those same kinds of memory in the early'90s. Numerous, detailed e-mails of a former Rambus representative, Richard Crisp, on that standards-making organization took center stage this week. Under questioning by an Infineon lawyer, Crisp said Rambus had pursued patent claims broad enough to cover designs being developed as industry standards. "In some cases that was true," he said. Later, Infineon attorney John Desmarais asked, "Why didn't you stand up and say, 'Hey, stop! That's our invention.'" But that's not the whole story, Crisp and Rambus lawyers told the jury. Rambus believed its first patent, issued in 1993, contained technical specifications that proved the company did invent key elements of several memory designs. What the company was doing by developing additional patent applications as the standards were being discussed, Crisp testified, was an attempt to protect what the company believed was rightfully its intellectual property. Other members failed to disclose patents to the organization at the same time, according to Rambus testimony. And Crisp suggested memory manufacturers pulled key parts of Rambus technology and advanced it through the standards board to blunt Rambus' business. "It basically looked to me like they were ripping off all of our technology," he said of his time on the panel. If Infineon proves its allegations, the verdict could render key Rambus patents unenforceable, though it would not influence the company's primary design. Contact McGregor McCance at (804) 649-6348 or mmccance@timesdispatch.com