Rambus Incorporated, founded in 1990, is an American technology company that
designs
A design is a plan or specification for the construction of an object or system or for the implementation of an activity or process or the result of that plan or specification in the form of a prototype, product, or process. The verb ''to design'' ...
,
develops and
licenses
A license (or licence) is an official permission or permit to do, use, or own something (as well as the document of that permission or permit).
A license is granted by a party (licensor) to another party (licensee) as an element of an agreeme ...
chip
interface technologies and
architectures
Architecture is the art and technique of designing and building, as distinguished from the skills associated with construction. It is both the process and the product of sketching, conceiving, planning, designing, and constructing buildings o ...
that are used in
digital electronics products. The company is well known for
inventing
An invention is a unique or novel device, method, composition, idea or process. An invention may be an improvement upon a machine, product, or process for increasing efficiency or lowering cost. It may also be an entirely new concept. If an ...
RDRAM
Rambus DRAM (RDRAM), and its successors Concurrent Rambus DRAM (CRDRAM) and Direct Rambus DRAM (DRDRAM), are types of synchronous dynamic random-access memory (SDRAM) developed by Rambus from the 1990s through to the early 2000s. The third-generati ...
and for its
intellectual property
Intellectual property (IP) is a category of property that includes intangible creations of the human intellect. There are many types of intellectual property, and some countries recognize more than others. The best-known types are patents, cop ...
-based litigation following the introduction of
DDR-SDRAM
Double Data Rate Synchronous Dynamic Random-Access Memory (DDR SDRAM) is a double data rate (DDR) synchronous dynamic random-access memory (SDRAM) class of memory integrated circuits used in computers. DDR SDRAM, also retroactively called DDR1 ...
memory.
History
Rambus was founded in March, 1990 by
electrical
Electricity is the set of physical phenomena associated with the presence and motion of matter that has a property of electric charge. Electricity is related to magnetism, both being part of the phenomenon of electromagnetism, as described ...
and
computer engineers
Computer engineering (CoE or CpE) is a branch of electrical engineering and computer science that integrates several fields of computer science and electronic engineering required to develop computer hardware and software. Computer engineers ...
, Dr.
Mike Farmwald
Mike may refer to:
Animals
* Mike (cat), cat and guardian of the British Museum
* Mike the Headless Chicken, chicken that lived for 18 months after his head had been cut off
* Mike (chimpanzee), a chimpanzee featured in several books and document ...
and Dr.
Mark Horowitz
Mark A. Horowitz is the Yahoo! Founders Professor in the School of Engineering at Stanford University and holds a joint appointment in the Electrical Engineering and Computer Science department. He is a co-founder of Rambus Inc., now a technolo ...
. The company's early
investors
An investor is a person who allocates financial capital with the expectation of a future return (profit) or to gain an advantage (interest). Through this allocated capital most of the time the investor purchases some species of property. Type ...
included premier
venture capital
Venture capital (often abbreviated as VC) is a form of private equity financing that is provided by venture capital firms or funds to start-up company, startups, early-stage, and emerging companies that have been deemed to have high growth poten ...
and
investment banking firms such as
Kleiner Perkins Caufield and Byers
Kleiner Perkins, formerly Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers (KPCB), is an American venture capital firm which specializes in investing in incubation, early stage and growth companies. Since its founding in 1972, the firm has backed entrepreneurs ...
,
Merrill Lynch, Mohr Davidow Ventures, and
Goldman Sachs
Goldman Sachs () is an American multinational investment bank and financial services company. Founded in 1869, Goldman Sachs is headquartered at 200 West Street in Lower Manhattan, with regional headquarters in London, Warsaw, Bangalore, H ...
.
Rambus was
incorporated and founded as
California
California is a U.S. state, state in the Western United States, located along the West Coast of the United States, Pacific Coast. With nearly 39.2million residents across a total area of approximately , it is the List of states and territori ...
company in 1990 and then
re-incorporated in the state of
Delaware
Delaware ( ) is a state in the Mid-Atlantic region of the United States, bordering Maryland to its south and west; Pennsylvania to its north; and New Jersey and the Atlantic Ocean to its east. The state takes its name from the adjacent Del ...
before the company
went public in 1997 on the
NASDAQ
The Nasdaq Stock Market () (National Association of Securities Dealers Automated Quotations Stock Market) is an American stock exchange based in New York City. It is the most active stock trading venue in the US by volume, and ranked second ...
stock exchange
A stock exchange, securities exchange, or bourse is an exchange where stockbrokers and traders can buy and sell securities, such as shares of stock, bonds and other financial instruments. Stock exchanges may also provide facilities for th ...
under the
symbol RMBS.
In the 1990s, Rambus was a high-speed interface technology development and marketing company that invented 600 MHz interface technology, which solved memory bottleneck issues faced by system designers. Rambus's technology was based on a very high speed, chip-to-chip interface that was incorporated on dynamic random-access-memory (
DRAM)
components,
processors
A central processing unit (CPU), also called a central processor, main processor or just processor, is the electronic circuitry that executes instructions comprising a computer program. The CPU performs basic arithmetic, logic, controlling, ...
and
controller
Controller may refer to:
Occupations
* Controller or financial controller, or in government accounting comptroller, a senior accounting position
* Controller, someone who performs agent handling in espionage
* Air traffic controller, a person ...
s, which achieved performance rates over ten times faster than conventional
DRAMs. Rambus's
RDRAM
Rambus DRAM (RDRAM), and its successors Concurrent Rambus DRAM (CRDRAM) and Direct Rambus DRAM (DRDRAM), are types of synchronous dynamic random-access memory (SDRAM) developed by Rambus from the 1990s through to the early 2000s. The third-generati ...
transferred data at 600 MHz over a narrow byte-wide Rambus
Channel
Channel, channels, channeling, etc., may refer to:
Geography
* Channel (geography), in physical geography, a landform consisting of the outline (banks) of the path of a narrow body of water.
Australia
* Channel Country, region of outback Austral ...
to Rambus-compatible
Integrated Circuits
An integrated circuit or monolithic integrated circuit (also referred to as an IC, a chip, or a microchip) is a set of electronic circuits on one small flat piece (or "chip") of semiconductor material, usually silicon. Large numbers of tiny ...
(ICs).
Rambus's interface was an
open standard, accessible to all semiconductor companies, such as
Intel
Intel Corporation is an American multinational corporation and technology company headquartered in Santa Clara, California. It is the world's largest semiconductor chip manufacturer by revenue, and is one of the developers of the x86 seri ...
. Rambus provided companies who licensed its technology a full range of
reference design
Reference design refers to a technical blueprint of a system that is intended for others to copy. It contains the essential elements of the system; however, third parties may enhance or modify the design as required. When discussing computer desi ...
s and engineering services.
Rambus's interface technology was broadly licensed to leading
DRAM,
ASIC and
PC peripheral chipset
In a computer system, a chipset is a set of electronic components in one or more integrated circuits known as a "Data Flow Management System" that manages the data flow between the processor, memory and peripherals. It is usually found on the mo ...
suppliers in the 1990s. Licensees of Rambus's
RDRAM
Rambus DRAM (RDRAM), and its successors Concurrent Rambus DRAM (CRDRAM) and Direct Rambus DRAM (DRDRAM), are types of synchronous dynamic random-access memory (SDRAM) developed by Rambus from the 1990s through to the early 2000s. The third-generati ...
technology included companies such as
Creative Labs
Creative Technology Ltd. is a Singaporean multinational technology company headquartered with overseas offices in Shanghai, Tokyo, Dublin, and Silicon Valley (where in the US it is known as Creative Labs). The principal activities of the compa ...
,
Intel
Intel Corporation is an American multinational corporation and technology company headquartered in Santa Clara, California. It is the world's largest semiconductor chip manufacturer by revenue, and is one of the developers of the x86 seri ...
,
Microsoft
Microsoft Corporation is an American multinational technology corporation producing computer software, consumer electronics, personal computers, and related services headquartered at the Microsoft Redmond campus located in Redmond, Washing ...
,
Nintendo
is a Japanese Multinational corporation, multinational video game company headquartered in Kyoto, Japan. It develops video games and video game consoles.
Nintendo was founded in 1889 as by craftsman Fusajiro Yamauchi and originally produce ...
,
Silicon Graphics
Silicon Graphics, Inc. (stylized as SiliconGraphics before 1999, later rebranded SGI, historically known as Silicon Graphics Computer Systems or SGCS) was an American high-performance computing manufacturer, producing computer hardware and sof ...
,
Hitachi
() is a Japanese multinational corporation, multinational Conglomerate (company), conglomerate corporation headquartered in Chiyoda, Tokyo, Japan. It is the parent company of the Hitachi Group (''Hitachi Gurūpu'') and had formed part of the Ni ...
,
Hyundai Hyundai is a South Korean industrial conglomerate ("chaebol"), which was restructured into the following groups:
* Hyundai Group, parts of the former conglomerate which have not been divested
** Hyundai Mobis, Korean car parts company
** Hyundai ...
,
IBM,
Molex,
Macronix
Macronix International Co., Ltd. (MCIX; often shortened to Macronix) is an integrated device manufacturer in the non-volatile memory (NVM) market. The company manufactures NOR Flash, NAND Flash, and ROM products for the consumer, communication ...
and
NEC
is a Japanese multinational information technology and electronics corporation, headquartered in Minato, Tokyo. The company was known as the Nippon Electric Company, Limited, before rebranding in 1983 as NEC. It provides IT and network soluti ...
.
Rambus
RDRAM
Rambus DRAM (RDRAM), and its successors Concurrent Rambus DRAM (CRDRAM) and Direct Rambus DRAM (DRDRAM), are types of synchronous dynamic random-access memory (SDRAM) developed by Rambus from the 1990s through to the early 2000s. The third-generati ...
technology was integrated into products such as
Nintendo 64
The (N64) is a home video game console developed by Nintendo. The successor to the Super Nintendo Entertainment System, it was released on June 23, 1996, in Japan, on September 29, 1996, in North America, and on March 1, 1997, in Europe and ...
,
Microsoft
Microsoft Corporation is an American multinational technology corporation producing computer software, consumer electronics, personal computers, and related services headquartered at the Microsoft Redmond campus located in Redmond, Washing ...
's
Talisman
A talisman is any object ascribed with religious or magical powers intended to protect, heal, or harm individuals for whom they are made. Talismans are often portable objects carried on someone in a variety of ways, but can also be installed perm ...
3D graphics chip set,
Creative Labs
Creative Technology Ltd. is a Singaporean multinational technology company headquartered with overseas offices in Shanghai, Tokyo, Dublin, and Silicon Valley (where in the US it is known as Creative Labs). The principal activities of the compa ...
Graphics Blaster 3D
Graphics cards for
PCs,
workstations
A workstation is a special computer designed for technical or scientific applications. Intended primarily to be used by a single user, they are commonly connected to a local area network and run multi-user operating systems. The term ''worksta ...
manufactured by
Silicon Graphics
Silicon Graphics, Inc. (stylized as SiliconGraphics before 1999, later rebranded SGI, historically known as Silicon Graphics Computer Systems or SGCS) was an American high-performance computing manufacturer, producing computer hardware and sof ...
and Intel's system memory
chipsets
In a computer system, a chipset is a set of electronic components in one or more integrated circuits known as a "Data Flow Management System" that manages the data flow between the processor, memory and peripherals. It is usually found on the mo ...
for PCs.
In 2003, Rambus Incorporated announced that
Toshiba Corp. and
Elpida Memory
Micron Memory Japan, K.K. is a Japanese subsidiary of Micron Technology. It was formerly known as established in 1999 that developed, designed, manufactured and sold dynamic random-access memory (DRAM) products. It was also a semiconductor fou ...
Inc. will produce its new memory technology, known as XDR DRAM.
The memory technology is capable of running at 3.2 GHz and is said to be faster than any memory technology available in consumer entertainment devices and PCs at the time.
Rambus purchased
Cryptography Research
Cryptography Research, Inc. is a San Francisco based cryptography company specializing in applied cryptographic engineering, including technologies for building tamper-resistant semiconductors. It was purchased on June 6, 2011 by Rambus for $342. ...
on June 6, 2011, for $342.5M. This will enable Rambus Inc. to develop its semiconductor licensing portfolio to include CRI's content protection and security. According to Rambus CEO Harold Hughes, the CRI security technologies would be applied to a variety of products in the company's IP portfolio.
Today, Rambus derives the majority of its annual revenue by licensing its technologies and
patents for chip interfaces to its customers. According to ''
The Wall Street Journal
''The Wall Street Journal'' is an American business-focused, international daily newspaper based in New York City, with international editions also available in Chinese and Japanese. The ''Journal'', along with its Asian editions, is published ...
'', history of Rambus has been "marked by litigation, including patent battles with numerous chip makers".
On August 17, 2015, Rambus announced the new R+ DDR4 server memory chips RB26 DDR4 RDIMM and RB26 DDR4 LRDIMM. The chipset includes a DDR4 Register Clock Driver and
Data Buffer
In computer science, a data buffer (or just buffer) is a region of a memory used to temporarily store data while it is being moved from one place to another. Typically, the data is stored in a buffer as it is retrieved from an input device (such a ...
, and it's fully-compliant with the JEDEC DDR4.
In 2016, Rambus acquired
Semtech's Snowbush IP for US$32.5 million. Snowbush IP provides analog and mixed-signal IP technologies, and will expand Rambus’ product offerings.
In 2016, Rambus acquired
Inphi Memory Interconnect Business, for US$90 million.
The acquisition includes all assets of the Inphi Memory Interconnect Business, such as customer contracts, product inventory, supply chain agreements, and intellectual property.
On November 2, 2017, Rambus announced partnership with
Interac Association
Interac is a Canadian interbank network that links financial institutions and other enterprises for the purpose of exchanging electronic financial transactions. Interac serves as the Canadian debit card system and the predominant funds transf ...
and
Samsung Canada
The Samsung Group (or simply Samsung) ( ko, 삼성 ) is a South Korean multinational manufacturing conglomerate headquartered in Samsung Town, Seoul, South Korea. It comprises numerous affiliated businesses, most of them united under the ...
to assist in enabling Samsung Pay in Canada.
In 2018, Rambus agreed to renew a patent license with
NVIDIA
Nvidia CorporationOfficially written as NVIDIA and stylized in its logo as VIDIA with the lowercase "n" the same height as the uppercase "VIDIA"; formerly stylized as VIDIA with a large italicized lowercase "n" on products from the mid 1990s to ...
. Rambus would be sharing its patent portfolio, including those covering
serial link
In telecommunication and data transmission, serial communication is the process of sending data one bit at a time, sequentially, over a communication channel or computer bus. This is in contrast to parallel communication, where several bits are ...
s and
memory controller
The memory controller is a digital circuit that manages the flow of data going to and from the computer's main memory. A memory controller can be a separate chip or integrated into another chip, such as being placed on the same die or as an int ...
s, with NVIDIA.
On December 11, 2019, Rambus HBM2 PHY and Memory Controller IP were announced to be used in Inflame Technology's AI training chip.
In 2019, Rambus announced that it will move headquarters from
Sunnyvale, California
Sunnyvale () is a city located in the Santa Clara Valley in northwest Santa Clara County in the U.S. state of California.
Sunnyvale lies along the historic El Camino Real and Highway 101 and is bordered by portions of San Jose to the nort ...
to
North San Jose
North San Jose (abbreviated as NSJ) is the northern region of the city of San Jose, California. North San Jose is made up of numerous neighborhoods grouped into three districts: Alviso, Berryessa, and Rincon / Golden Triangle. North San Jose ...
, California.
In 2021, Rambus announced that it started an expedited share buyback program with
Deutsche Bank
Deutsche Bank AG (), sometimes referred to simply as Deutsche, is a German multinational investment bank and financial services company headquartered in Frankfurt, Germany, and dual-listed on the Frankfurt Stock Exchange and the New York Sto ...
to buy up roughly $100 million in common stock. Rambus also acquired two companies, AnalogX and PLDA, which specialise in physical links for
PCIe
PCI Express (Peripheral Component Interconnect Express), officially abbreviated as PCIe or PCI-e, is a high-speed serial computer expansion bus standard, designed to replace the older PCI, PCI-X and AGP bus standards. It is the common ...
and
CXL protocols.
In May 2022, it was announced Rambus had acquired the
Montreal
Montreal ( ; officially Montréal, ) is the List of the largest municipalities in Canada by population, second-most populous city in Canada and List of towns in Quebec, most populous city in the Provinces and territories of Canada, Canadian ...
-headquartered electronic design company, Hardent.
Technology
![Rambus HQ patent wall section](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/6/6b/Rambus_HQ_patent_wall_section.JPG)
An early version of
RDRAM
Rambus DRAM (RDRAM), and its successors Concurrent Rambus DRAM (CRDRAM) and Direct Rambus DRAM (DRDRAM), are types of synchronous dynamic random-access memory (SDRAM) developed by Rambus from the 1990s through to the early 2000s. The third-generati ...
, base RDRAM, was used in the
Nintendo 64
The (N64) is a home video game console developed by Nintendo. The successor to the Super Nintendo Entertainment System, it was released on June 23, 1996, in Japan, on September 29, 1996, in North America, and on March 1, 1997, in Europe and ...
that was released in 1996.
The first PC motherboards with support for
RDRAM
Rambus DRAM (RDRAM), and its successors Concurrent Rambus DRAM (CRDRAM) and Direct Rambus DRAM (DRDRAM), are types of synchronous dynamic random-access memory (SDRAM) developed by Rambus from the 1990s through to the early 2000s. The third-generati ...
were released in 1999. They supported PC800 RDRAM, which operated at 400 MHz but presented data on both the rising and falling edge of the clock cycle resulting in effectively 800 MHz, and delivered 1600 MB/s of
bandwidth
Bandwidth commonly refers to:
* Bandwidth (signal processing) or ''analog bandwidth'', ''frequency bandwidth'', or ''radio bandwidth'', a measure of the width of a frequency range
* Bandwidth (computing), the rate of data transfer, bit rate or thr ...
over a 16-bit bus using a 184-pin
RIMM form factor. This was significantly faster than the previous standard, PC133 SDRAM, which operated at 133 MHz and delivered 1066 MB/s of bandwidth over a 64-bit bus using a 168-pin
DIMM
A DIMM () (Dual In-line Memory Module), commonly called a RAM stick, comprises a series of dynamic random-access memory integrated circuits. These memory modules are mounted on a printed circuit board and designed for use in personal compute ...
form factor.
Some disadvantages of RDRAM technology, however, included significantly increased latency, power dissipation as heat, manufacturing complexity, and cost. PC800 RDRAM operated with a minimum latency of 45 ns, compared to 15 ns for PC133 SDRAM. RDRAMs can also be told to increase their latencies in order to prevent the possibility of two or more chips transmitting at the same time and causing a collision. However, SDRAM latency depends on the current state of memory so its latency can vary widely depending on what happened earlier and the strategy used by the SDRAM controller, while RDRAM latency is constant once it has been established by the memory controller. RDRAM memory chips also put out significantly more heat than SDRAM chips, necessitating
heatsink
A heat sink (also commonly spelled heatsink) is a passive heat exchanger that transfers the heat generated by an electronic or a mechanical device to a fluid medium, often air or a liquid coolant, where it is dissipated away from the device, th ...
s on all RIMM devices. RDRAM also includes a memory controller on each memory chip, significantly increasing manufacturing complexity compared to SDRAM, which used a single memory controller located on the
northbridge chipset. RDRAM was also two to three times the price of PC133 SDRAM due to manufacturing costs, license fees and other market factors.
With the introduction of the
Intel 840 chipset, dual-channel support was added for PC800 RDRAM, doubling bandwidth to 3200 MB/s by increasing the bus width to 32-bit. This was followed in 2002 by the
Intel 850E chipset, which introduced PC1066 RDRAM, increasing total dual-channel bandwidth to 4266 MB/s. Also in 2002, Intel released the
E7205
This article provides a list of motherboard chipsets made by Intel, divided into three main categories: those that use the PCI bus for interconnection (the 4xx series), those that connect using specialized "hub links" (the 8xx series), and those ...
chipset, which introduced dual-channel DDR support for a total bandwidth of 4266 MB/s, but at a much lower latency than competing RDRAM. In 2003, Intel released the
875P
This article provides a list of motherboard chipsets made by Intel, divided into three main categories: those that use the Peripheral Component Interconnect, PCI bus for interconnection (the 4xx series), those that connect using specialized "hub ...
chipset, and along with it dual-channel DDR400. With a total bandwidth of 6400 MB/s, it marked the end of RDRAM as a technology with competitive performance.
Rambus also developed and licensed its
XDR DRAM
XDR DRAM (extreme data rate dynamic random-access memory) is a high-performance dynamic random-access memory interface. It is based on and succeeds RDRAM. Competing technologies include DDR2 and GDDR4.
Overview
XDR was designed to be effecti ...
technology, notably used in the
PlayStation 3
The PlayStation 3 (PS3) is a home video game console developed by Sony Interactive Entertainment, Sony Computer Entertainment. The successor to the PlayStation 2, it is part of the PlayStation brand of consoles. It was first released on Novemb ...
, and more recently
XDR2 DRAM XDR2 DRAM was a proposed type of dynamic random-access memory that was offered by Rambus. It was announced on July 7, 2005 and the specification for which was released on March 26, 2008. Rambus has designed XDR2 as an evolution of, and the successor ...
.
Lawsuits
In the early 1990s, Rambus was invited to join the
JEDEC
The JEDEC Solid State Technology Association is an independent semiconductor engineering trade organization and standardization body headquartered in Arlington County, Virginia, United States.
JEDEC has over 300 members, including some of the w ...
. Rambus had been trying to interest memory manufacturers in licensing their proprietary memory interface, and numerous companies had signed
non-disclosure agreement
A non-disclosure agreement (NDA) is a legal contract or part of a contract between at least two parties that outlines confidential material, knowledge, or information that the parties wish to share with one another for certain purposes, but wish ...
s to view Rambus' technical data. During the later ''Infineon v. Rambus'' trial,
Infineon
Infineon Technologies AG is a German semiconductor manufacturer founded in 1999, when the semiconductor operations of the former parent company Siemens AG were spun off. Infineon has about 50,280 employees and is one of the ten largest semicond ...
memos from a meeting with representatives of other manufacturers surfaced, including the line "
e day all computers will be built this way, but hopefully without the royalties going to Rambus", and continuing with a strategy discussion for reducing or eliminating royalties to be paid to Rambus. As Rambus continued its participation in JEDEC, it became apparent that they were not prepared to agree to JEDEC's patent policy requiring owners of patents included in a standard to agree to license that technology under terms that are "reasonable and non-discriminatory", and Rambus withdrew from the organization in 1995. Memos from Rambus at that time showed they were tailoring new patent applications to cover features of SDRAM being discussed, which were public knowledge (JEDEC meetings are not secret) and perfectly legal for patent owners who have patented underlying innovations, but were seen as evidence of bad faith by the jury in the first ''Infineon v. Rambus'' trial. The
Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit (CAFC) rejected this theory of bad faith in its decision overturning the fraud conviction Infineon achieved in the first trial (see below).
Patent lawsuits
In 2000, Rambus began filing lawsuits against the largest memory manufacturers, claiming that they owned SDRAM and DDR technology. Seven manufacturers, including
Samsung
The Samsung Group (or simply Samsung) ( ko, 삼성 ) is a South Korean multinational manufacturing conglomerate headquartered in Samsung Town, Seoul, South Korea. It comprises numerous affiliated businesses, most of them united under the ...
, quickly settled with Rambus and agreed to pay royalties on SDRAM and DDR memory. In May 2001, Rambus was found guilty of fraud for having claimed that it owned SDRAM and DDR technology, and all infringement claims against memory manufacturers were dismissed. In January 2003, the CAFC overturned the fraud verdict of the jury trial in
Virginia
Virginia, officially the Commonwealth of Virginia, is a state in the Mid-Atlantic and Southeastern regions of the United States, between the Atlantic Coast and the Appalachian Mountains. The geography and climate of the Commonwealth ar ...
under Judge Payne, issued a new claims construction, and remanded the case back to Virginia for re-trial on infringement. In October 2003, the
U.S. Supreme Court
The Supreme Court of the United States (SCOTUS) is the highest court in the federal judiciary of the United States. It has ultimate appellate jurisdiction over all U.S. federal court cases, and over state court cases that involve a point o ...
refused to hear the case. Thus, the case returned to Virginia per the CAFC ruling.
In January 2005, Rambus filed four more lawsuits against memory chip makers
Hynix Semiconductor,
Nanya Technology
Formosa Plastics Group (FPG, ) is a titular Taiwanese conglomerate of diverse interests, including biotechnology, petrochemical processing and production of electronics components. The company was founded by Wang Yung-ching and his brother Wan ...
,
Inotera Memories and Infineon Technology claiming that DDR2, GDDR2 and GDDR3 chips contain Rambus technology. In March 2005, Rambus had its claim for patent infringements against Infineon dismissed. Rambus was accused of shredding key documents prior to court hearings, the judge agreed and dismissed Rambus' case against Infineon. This led Rambus to negotiate a settlement with Infineon, which agreed to pay Rambus quarterly license fees of $5.9 million and in return, both companies ceased all litigation against each other. The agreement ran from November 2005 to November 2007. After this date, if Rambus had enough remaining agreements in place, Infineon may make extra payments up to $100 million. In June 2005, Rambus also sued one of its strongest proponents, Samsung, the world's largest memory manufacturer, and terminated Samsung's license. Samsung had promoted Rambus's RDRAM and currently remains a licensee of Rambus's
XDR memory.
In February 2006,
Micron Technology sued Rambus, alleging that Rambus had violated
RICO
The Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations (RICO) Act is a United States federal law that provides for extended criminal penalties and a civil cause of action for acts performed as part of an ongoing criminal organization.
RICO was en ...
and deliberately harmed Micron.
On April 29, 2008, the
Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit
The United States Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit (in case citations, Fed. Cir. or C.A.F.C.) is a United States court of appeals that has special appellate jurisdiction over certain types of specialized cases in the U.S. federal court ...
issued a ruling vacating the order of the
U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Virginia
The United States District Court for the Eastern District of Virginia (in case citations, E.D. Va.) is one of two United States district courts serving the Commonwealth of Virginia. It has jurisdiction over the Northern Virginia, Hampton ...
, saying the case with Samsung should be dismissed, saying Judge Robert E. Payne's findings critical of Rambus, were on a case that had already been settled, and thus had no
legal standing
Law is a set of rules that are created and are law enforcement, enforceable by social or governmental institutions to regulate behavior,Robertson, ''Crimes against humanity'', 90. with its precise definition a matter of longstanding debate. ...
.
On January 9, 2009, a Delaware federal judge ruled that Rambus could not enforce patents against Micron Technology Inc., stating that Rambus had a "clear and convincing" show of bad faith, and ruled that Rambus' destruction of key related documents (
spoliation of evidence) nullified its right to enforce its patents against Micron.
In July 2009, the
United States Patent and Trademark Office
The United States Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO) is an agency in the U.S. Department of Commerce that serves as the national patent office and trademark registration authority for the United States. The USPTO's headquarters are in Alexa ...
(USPTO) rejected 8 claims by Rambus against
Nvidia
Nvidia CorporationOfficially written as NVIDIA and stylized in its logo as VIDIA with the lowercase "n" the same height as the uppercase "VIDIA"; formerly stylized as VIDIA with a large italicized lowercase "n" on products from the mid 1990s to ...
.
On November 24, 2009, the USPTO rejected all 17 claims in three Rambus patents that the company asserted against Nvidia in a complaint filed with the
U.S. International Trade Commission
The United States International Trade Commission (USITC or I.T.C.) is an agency of the United States federal government that advises the legislature, legislative and executive (government), executive branches on matters of trade. It is an indepe ...
(ITC). However the ITC has announced that out of five patents, Nvidia did violate three of them. Due to this ruling Nvidia faced a potential U.S. import ban on some of its chips used in the
nForce
nForce is a motherboard chipset created by Nvidia originally for AMD Athlon and Duron, with later revisions also supporting contemporary Intel processors. The chipset shipped in 3 varieties; 220, 415, and 420. 2 ...
,
Quadro
Quadro was Nvidia's brand for graphics cards intended for use in workstations running professional computer-aided design (CAD), computer-generated imagery (CGI), digital content creation (DCC) applications, scientific calculations and machine ...
,
GeForce
GeForce is a brand of graphics processing units (GPUs) designed by Nvidia. As of the GeForce 40 series, there have been eighteen iterations of the design. The first GeForce products were discrete GPUs designed for add-on graphics boards, inte ...
, Tesla, and
Tegra
Tegra is a system on a chip (SoC) series developed by Nvidia for mobile devices such as smartphones, personal digital assistants, and mobile Internet devices. The Tegra integrates an ARM architecture central processing unit (CPU), graphics proc ...
series graphics products—nearly every video card type manufactured by Nvidia.
On June 20, 2011, Rambus went to trial against Micron and Hynix in California, seeking as much as $12.9 billion in damages for "a secret and unlawful conspiracy to kill a revolutionary technology, make billions of dollars and hang onto power", Rambus lawyer Bart Williams told jurors. Rambus lost on November 16, 2011, in the jury trial and its shares dropped drastically, from $14.04 to $4.00 per share.
On November 16, 2011, Rambus lost the antitrust case against Micron Technology and Hynix Semiconductor. The
San Francisco County Superior Court
The Superior Court of California of the County of San Francisco is the state superior court with jurisdiction over the City and County of San Francisco.
History
In 1976 the Court helped to create the San Francisco Pretrial Diversion Project, a ...
jury ruled against Rambus in a 9–3 vote. In a statement posted on the company's website, Rambus CEO Harold Hughes said: "We are reviewing our options for appeal".
On January 24, 2012, a USPTO appeals board declared the third of three patents known as the "Barth patents" invalid. The first two had been declared invalid in September 2011. Rambus had used these patents to win infringement lawsuits against Nvidia Corp and
Hewlett-Packard.
On June 28, 2013, The Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit reversed the USPTO and the '109 Barth patent's validity was reinstated:
"In conclusion, the Board's determination that all 25
claims of the '109 Patent are invalid as anticipated by
Farmwald is not supported by substantial evidence.
Accordingly, this court reverses."
Federal Trade Commission antitrust suits
In May 2002, the United States
Federal Trade Commission
The Federal Trade Commission (FTC) is an independent agency of the United States government whose principal mission is the enforcement of civil (non-criminal) antitrust law and the promotion of consumer protection. The FTC shares jurisdiction ov ...
(FTC) filed charges against Rambus for antitrust violations. Specifically, the FTC complaint asserted that through the use of patent continuations and divisionals, Rambus pursued a strategy of expanding the scope of its patent claims to encompass the emerging SDRAM standard. The FTC's antitrust allegations against Rambus went to trial in the summer of 2003 after the organization formally accused Rambus of anti-competitive behavior the previous June, itself the result of an investigation launched in May 2002 at the behest of the memory manufacturers. The FTC's chief administrative-law judge, Stephen J. McGuire, dismissed the antitrust claims against Rambus in 2006, saying that the memory industry had no reasonable alternatives to Rambus technology and was aware of the potential scope of Rambus patent rights, according to the company. Soon after, FTC investigators filed a brief to appeal against that ruling.
On August 2, 2006, the FTC overturned McGuire's ruling, stating that Rambus illegally monopolized the memory industry under section 2 of the
Sherman Antitrust Act
The Sherman Antitrust Act of 1890 (, ) is a United States antitrust law which prescribes the rule of free competition among those engaged in commerce. It was passed by Congress and is named for Senator John Sherman, its principal author.
...
, and also practiced deception that violated section 5 of the
Federal Trade Commission Act.
February 5, 2007, the FTC issued a ruling that limits maximum royalties that Rambus may demand from manufacturers of
dynamic random-access memory
Dynamic random-access memory (dynamic RAM or DRAM) is a type of random-access semiconductor memory that stores each bit of data in a memory cell, usually consisting of a tiny capacitor and a transistor, both typically based on metal-oxide ...
(DRAM), which was set to 0.5% for DDR SDRAM for 3 years from the date the commission's Order is issued and then going to 0; while SDRAM's maximum royalty was set to 0.25%. The Commission claimed that halving the DDR SDRAM rate for SDRAM would reflect the fact that while DDR SDRAM utilizes four of the relevant Rambus technologies, SDRAM uses only two. In addition to collecting fees for DRAM chips, Rambus will also be able to receive 0.5% and 1.0% royalties for SDRAM and DDR SDRAM memory controllers or other non-memory chip components respectively. However, the ruling did not prohibit Rambus from collecting royalties on products based on DDR2 SDRAM, GDDR2, and other JEDEC post-DDR memory standards. Rambus has appealed the FTC Opinion/Remedy and awaits a court date for the appeal.
On March 26, 2008, the jury of the
U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California determined that had Rambus acted properly while a member of the standard-setting organization JEDEC during its participating in the early 1990s, finding that the memory manufacturers did not meet their burden of proving antitrust and fraud claims.
On April 22, 2008, the
U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit overturned the FTC reversal of McGuire's 2006 ruling, saying that the FTC had not established that Rambus had harmed the competition.
On February 23, 2009, the
U.S. Supreme Court
The Supreme Court of the United States (SCOTUS) is the highest court in the federal judiciary of the United States. It has ultimate appellate jurisdiction over all U.S. federal court cases, and over state court cases that involve a point o ...
rejected the bids by the FTC to impose royalty sanctions on Rambus via antitrust penalties.
European Commission antitrust suit
July 30, 2007, the
European Commission
The European Commission (EC) is the executive of the European Union (EU). It operates as a cabinet government, with 27 members of the Commission (informally known as "Commissioners") headed by a President. It includes an administrative body o ...
launched antitrust investigations against Rambus, taking the view that Rambus engaged in intentional deceptive conduct in the context of the standard-setting process for example by not disclosing the existence of the patents which it later claimed were relevant to the adopted standard. This type of behaviour is known as a "
patent ambush A patent ambush occurs when a member of a standard-setting organization withholds information, during participation in development and setting a standard, about a patent that the member or the member's company owns, has pending, or intends to file, ...
". Against this background, the Commission provisionally considered that Rambus breached the EC Treaty's rules on abuse of a dominant market position (Article 82 EC Treaty) by subsequently claiming unreasonable royalties for the use of those relevant patents. The commission's preliminary view is that without its "patent ambush", Rambus would not have been able to charge the royalty rates it currently does.
Recent settlements
In 2013 and 2014, Rambus settled and agreed on licensing terms with several of the companies involved in long-running disputes. On December 13, 2013, Rambus entered an agreement with Micron to let the latter use some of its patents, in exchange for $280 million worth of royalties over seven years. In June 2013, the company settled with SK Hynix, with Hynix paying $240 million to settle the disputes.
In March 2014, Rambus and Nanya signed a 5-year patent licensing agreement, settling earlier claims.
Rambus said these deals were part of a change in strategy to a less litigious, more collaborative approach, distancing themselves from accusations of
patent trolling. Ronald Black, Rambus's CEO, said, "Somehow we got thrown into the patent troll bunch…This is just not the case."
See also
* ''
Rambus Inc. v. Nvidia''
References
External links
*
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{{Authority control
Patent monetization companies of the United States
Semiconductor companies of the United States
Fabless semiconductor companies
Technology companies based in the San Francisco Bay Area
Companies based in San Jose, California
Computer companies established in 1990
Technology companies established in 1990
1990 establishments in California
Computer memory companies
Companies listed on the Nasdaq
1997 initial public offerings