Intel Settles To Escape $4 Billion Patent Suit with VLSI (theregister.com) 11
Intel and SoftBank-backed VLSI Technology have agreed to end a $4 billion patent dispute, according to documents filed in Delaware District Court this week. From a report: The decision marks a victory for Intel, which has already lost $3 billion in failed patent disputes to VLSI over the past few years. The case in question dates back to 2018 and alleged that Intel had infringed on five VLSI-owned patents governing things like secure communications, power optimization and delivery, and flip-chip interconnects.
If VLSI sounds familiar, that's because the company has been lurking around the semiconductor industry in one shape or form since the late '70s. The company originally made ASICs before it was acquired by Philips Electronics and later spun off under NXP. But despite any early successes in chipmaking, VLSI is now owned by SoftBank's Fortress Investment Group, and appears to exist solely to sue chipmakers it believes have violated its intellectual property -- in other words, it's a patent troll. The decision to call it quits comes after nearly five years of litigation. Tuesday, Intel and VLSI released a joint filing in which Intel and VLSI mutually agreed to dismiss the case and resolve all disputes over Intel's use of the aforementioned patents. Critically, VLSI has done so with prejudice. As we understand it, this means the company can't refile the case.
If VLSI sounds familiar, that's because the company has been lurking around the semiconductor industry in one shape or form since the late '70s. The company originally made ASICs before it was acquired by Philips Electronics and later spun off under NXP. But despite any early successes in chipmaking, VLSI is now owned by SoftBank's Fortress Investment Group, and appears to exist solely to sue chipmakers it believes have violated its intellectual property -- in other words, it's a patent troll. The decision to call it quits comes after nearly five years of litigation. Tuesday, Intel and VLSI released a joint filing in which Intel and VLSI mutually agreed to dismiss the case and resolve all disputes over Intel's use of the aforementioned patents. Critically, VLSI has done so with prejudice. As we understand it, this means the company can't refile the case.
If you read the article . . . (Score:5, Informative)
. . . it doesn't look like this is so much of a settlement as it is VLSI giving up.
"The decision to call it quits comes after nearly five years of litigation. Tuesday, Intel and VLSI released a joint filing in which Intel and VLSI mutually agreed to dismiss the case and resolve all disputes over Intel's use of the aforementioned patents. Critically, VLSI has done so with prejudice. As we understand it, this means the company can't refile the case.
VLSI also agreed to a covenant not to sue. So, in addition to not being able to refile the case, it's agreed not to sue Intel's partners over these specific patents. And, at least according to the court documents, Intel hasn't settled here. "Neither party is paying any amount of money to the other party," the filing reads.
It appears the case was headed toward dismissal anyway. In April, Chief Judge Colm Connolly issued a standing order to disclose the names of VLSI's owners, members, and partners to the court. However, as noted in an August memorandum [PDF], VLSI's disclosures were found to be lacking, leading Connolly to question whether the case should be dismissed."
While they've bilked Intel for $3 billion over the last few years, it looks like Intel may have a chance to get some of that money back:
"With that said, VLSI's behavior recently caught the attention of the US Patent and Trademark Office, which in October said it would investigate the validity of the company's patents. The review has the potential to overturn a previous $2.18 billion verdict against Intel."
Revoke all their patents (Score:1)
If they don't produce a product, all patent privileges should be forfeited. Voters have to get up and demand it, or it won't happen
Re: (Score:1)
I have patents and don't produce a product. I guess that everyone should be able to use my patents for free.
Re: (Score:1)
But yes, everyone should be able to use the method described in a non-productive patent for free.
Why do you think you should get free money for sitting on your arse? Why do you think we should be sympathetic to your cause of trying to get money for free?
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And if I take someone that is illegally using my patents to court, then I am a patent troll.
Re: (Score:1)
Yes, if you are not producing anything, and preventing others from doing so, then you are a patent troll, and should either license the patent or lose all privileges.
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Maybe I'm spending years developing the tech to put my bright idea into practice.
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But typically, you'd already have something underway by the time the patent is submitted and going through the process.
If you're just shitting out patent submissions left and right without even so much as a working process, then you are basically a patent troll, hoping that some vague patent, describing some hypothetical, but non-novel method, will catch some entity infringing. That is the definition of patent trolling.
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VLSI / ARM trivia (Score:3, Interesting)
VLSI were the original manufacturers of ARM CPUs - and the three other major chips - that Acorn designed for its high-performance 32-bit Archimedes desktop computers in the mid-80s.
The book documenting those chips was called Acorn RISC Machine Architecture Reference Manual, i.e. ARM ARM. Nerds.