Kludge
12-02-2010, 08:32 PM
"Technology licensing firm Rambus has gone to the International Trade Commission (ITC) to file a complaint asking for a very simple, even humble thing. They want the ITC to block the import and sale of any product infringing on its semiconductor patents. Sound reasonable? Well, it turns out that covers products from Broadcom, Freescale, NVIDIA, and more. As for the types of products Rambus thinks are infringing, that would be "personal computers, workstations, servers, routers, mobile phones and other handheld devices, set-top boxes, Blu-ray players, motherboards, plug-in cards, hard drives and modems." In case you haven't noticed, that's just about everything that makes us happy around here.
Rambus has been involved in a number of long running patent disputes with the likes of Nvidia. After trying in vain to work out licensing deals with everyone that's ever gone near a semiconductor, Rambus felt only legal action would get their point across. That's probably the real goal of this filing with the ITC. It is supremely unlikely that the commission would see fit to ban the sale of all these items. ITC complaints are a regular part of patent disputes, although they are not usually this expansive.
There is at least some validity to Rambus' claims. They won a partial victory over Nvidia last summer. But they do have quite the reputation at a patent troll these days. Should the world's technology companies just pay off Rambus, or is this just a lot of bluster?"
Article by Ryan Whitwam of Maximum PC
Original article link: http://www.maximumpc.com/article/news/rambus_wants_itc_halt_sale_everything
Rambus has been involved in a number of long running patent disputes with the likes of Nvidia. After trying in vain to work out licensing deals with everyone that's ever gone near a semiconductor, Rambus felt only legal action would get their point across. That's probably the real goal of this filing with the ITC. It is supremely unlikely that the commission would see fit to ban the sale of all these items. ITC complaints are a regular part of patent disputes, although they are not usually this expansive.
There is at least some validity to Rambus' claims. They won a partial victory over Nvidia last summer. But they do have quite the reputation at a patent troll these days. Should the world's technology companies just pay off Rambus, or is this just a lot of bluster?"
Article by Ryan Whitwam of Maximum PC
Original article link: http://www.maximumpc.com/article/news/rambus_wants_itc_halt_sale_everything