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

To: Dave B who wrote (21751)	6/5/1999 5:04:00 PM
From: Zeev Hed	Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 93625

Dave, actually, one of the "tricks" in the intellectual property field is to attach to the, license agreement a "trademark" agreement. Typically, the royalties are tied to both (and the advantage of trademarks they have much longer life than patents) and there is clause that the licensee displays on each items sold a legend like "Memories by Rambus" (it has a nice sound to it). Of course, the box makers are not the licensees here so that legend might be well hidden in the box. But, if the selling of the chip has an implied license to use the chip (particularly if some of the claims in the patents are method claims including method of using in conjunction with...), then for a very minimal fees (after all they have been paid by the memory producers) they could provide trademark rights to the box makers and in the process build a brand name. That kind of a brand name (which can take a number of years to build) may become a very important asset to Rambus in the future. I wonder if their strategic "heads" have been thinking along these lines. Zeev