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Intel Must Pay $150M for Patent Infringement
An anonymous reader writes "ExtremeTech is reporting that a U.S. district court has ruled that Intel's Itanium infringes Intergraph's intellectual property to the tune of $150 million in damages. The judge also cleared the way for Intergraph to request an injunction blocking sales of Itaniums and Itanium 2's."
...must be throwing a party right about now.
What's that smell? Ah, that's my karma burning...
I just wanted to be the first to say that.
I know this doesn't really have anything to do with DRM, but it would be nice if it would at least slow it down.
But on a more relevant note, isn't this also taking patents a little too far? It sounds like they've patented a kind of technology that is virtually inevitable in the computing field. Could I run out and patent the idea of 128 bit parallel chip?
If we're going to fight IP abuse, it may actually be in our interest to support intel on this one. Unfortunately that would be helping a company at the forefront of DRM.
Oh the horror.. We may be screwed either way.
The article fails to mention any technical details concerning the patent, but it sounds as if it has something to do with Intel's EPIC (which basicly is VLIW).
I'd say that Intel will have to pay, because if Intergraph stops the Itanium series of processors, it will mean an even bigger loss of money, and perhaps give AMD time to get a market advantage with the Hammer.
See it here http://www.theregister.co.uk/content/3/27561.html
It seems that intel has learned a lesson the chinese already knew with regards to making sure you really own your ip portfolio.
Or it could be proof that even the best lawyers can occasionally miss something embarrassing in a patent search.
Intel no doubt has a lot of patents that it regards as valuable, so it won't support a proposal to do away with patents all together. But a proposal to reduce the "landmine" effect of unknown patents might win support in the technology industry, because landmine patents are a nightmare to everyone there.
So, how do you prevent landmine patents but still keep the basic concept of a patent? Maybe the time has come for a "sweat of the brow" basis for patents. At present patents are granted on the "lightbulb moment" theory: the inventor has a flash of inspiration and the invention springs fully formed from his brow. But this leads to silly stuff like the infamous XOR patent (which patented the use of XOR for screen cursors in GUIs). However the justification for patents lies in the investment required to bring an idea to market. So maybe patents should be granted based on evidence of the hard work required to generate the invention.
What do you think?
Paul.
You are lost in a twisty maze of little standards, all different.
Take a look at AMD's stock price now and compare it to 1999. Now look at intels. They both have went down but AMD lost a hell of alot more.
http://saveie6.com/
From the FAQ...
I'm not a particularly big fan of Intel. But I want 64 bit processing to take off. This only hinders that. I'm really goddamn tired of our litigous society.
Is Intergraph going to market a 64 bit chip for us? No. So why the hell do they feel the need to... bah. Nevermind. I can't go anywhere with this, it just gets me upset.
"I will trust Google to 'do no evil' until the founders no longer run it." Hello Alphabet.
Here we have a typical case of the patent system working properly:
A smallish (relatively) company create an invention -- new hardware
A large company sees that, likes it, and decides to copy that invention
The smaller company sues for patent infringement, because hey, the big company didn't invent this
This is how things are supposed to work. Software patents are a completely different thing, but here we have a non-trivial hardware inovation that was patented and that patent was infringed upon. Please don't lump the two together under patent reform.
This is EXACTLY the sort of case that the patent system was set up to support. This is a GOOD example of patents working well. Intel infringed on the work of another individual, okay they claim they didn't know about it, but how much should we believe that a corporation like that didn't just think "Hell we've got the most lawyers".
Intel get zero sympathy from me here, too many big companies have played the lawyer card and won.
An Eye for an Eye will make the whole world blind - Gandhi
Have a look at the source of the patent claims:
Intergraph
It has extensive information about this lawsuit and a previous one, including legal docs, tech docs and some flash presentations for the technically impaired.
karma police: arrest this man, he talks in maths; he buzzes like a fridge, he's like a detuned radio. [radiohead]
I mean they used the same instruction set to input instructions and data, but by converting the x86 machine code into an internal machine code, they avoided directly implementing a x86 processor (although they did implement a translator) and thus (as a judge ruled, I recall) avoided patent infringment. Like I said, I wish I had an article to back this up.
In another matter how is it that the PIC is patentable? The article is plenty scant on technical details, but I got the impression that it was just a fancy term for pipelining, which has been around in supercomputers for 25-30 years. Does anyone out there know if PIC is some sort of new, exceptionally novell way of pipelining, or is it just another example of the patant office issuing a "you are the only one allowed to use this incredibly simple, obvious technique, that half the industry uses already."
Don't get me wrong, I'm not a big Intel fan, but still...
"A dictatorship would be a heck of a lot easier, there's no question about it." -George W. Bush
Cheque made payable to Intergraph for $149.99999...
Orginally a working model of the invention was one of the required submissions to the patent office. This caused something of a logistical problem and so the requirement was eventually dropped, but it shows that the writers of the original patent laws ( Jefferson primarily) understood the problems the current system faces.
"The Patent Act of 1790 (H.R. 41, introduced February 16, 1790, passed March 10, 1790) was crafted in part by Thomas Jefferson. As a result, it incorporated many of his beliefs including requirements for patents to have models submitted with all applications. Jefferson believed that ideas should not be patentable, rather patents should be issued only for physical inventions that have been reduced to practice."
http://www.m-cam.com/~watsonj/usptohistory.html
KFG
When big companies get hit a few times like this corporate America will start to see the point that there's really no one who benefits from the patent system the way it is right now. But doing away with patents altogether won't find any takers, as someone's pointed out. Still, this is a good time to start a serious campaign for patent reform. Some checks and balances should be built in, along these lines:
-
Anyone about to release a product submits a description of it to the PTO; patent holders who think the product infringes on their patent has a month or 2 to file a complaint and prove the infringement. The onus of looking out for possible infringement lies enrtirely with the patent holder.
-
A patent holder can not be allowed to sit on a patent indefinitely and prevent others from using the invention. To this end, a patent holder must produce proof that s/he is working to commercially exploit his patent if s/he wants to hold on to it for more than (say) 10 years.
I'm not sure if these are practical to implement the way I've put them, but you get the idea.Of course I don't think anything of this sort will happen in the near future, but that doesn't mean we shouldn't fight.
I understand why you don't want to let just anybody build products on the back of the research done by a company's scientists. But this sounds to me like Intergraph were not honestly trying to prevent Intel from using their IP. In fact, I think they might structure their buisiness model around this sort of deal: Patent something you know a big company is going to need soon, wait until they've completely commited to it, and beat a few million out of them in court. Would anybody call this a legitimate revenue model?
One might even feel bad for Intel, as they seem to attract some pretty slimy parasites recently (none worse than Rambus). However, one must remind oneself about all the frivolous IP infringement suits they filed against AMD and VIA. Then, this looks like cumupets (sp?).
This is a familiar pattern.
A company that fails in the market resorts to intellectual property suits to tax successful companies.
Let's be clear here, Intel didn't steal Integraphs designs, but now everyone who purchases an Itanium CPU from Intel must subsidise Integraph who had no hand in designing or manufacturing them.
IP patents lead to all sorts of problems. How different is different enough not to be sued? If I independently develop a similar, say, algorithm why shouldn't I be allowed to use it?
If I discover an optimal algorithm but then another makes the same discovery and patents it, how is this fair?
How can you tell the difference between an invention and a discovery? What if I use a different means to achieve the same specific end?
Sometimes when I think about pantent law, I say to myself, "Me, why does head feel like it being applied to sufficiently large cheese grater and vigorously shaken?" To which I answer, "You mindless grammar fiend! More brain washing for you!" and silenty look at the pretty blue colors at microsoft.com
Why, o why must the sky fall when I've learned to fly?
I had this great idea, and thought of Patenting it, but in the interests of open source and free software, decided to publish it for free use. As far as I know, there is no prior art. :-)
VCR Clock SettingA reliable sign of the absence of technical knowledge is to see the flashing 12:00 of a VCR. It seems that manufacturers can't get their act together, to create a UI that the average Joe (or Joanne) can use to set the time in the VCR (or Microwave oven.)
My idea is to add a single button, replacing all those time setting menus. On this button, and also on a large sheet of card in several languages, would be written the words "Press the Time button at 12 noon." Of course, technicians can also be trained to do this for those who have trouble following instructions.
Share and Enjoy!
[Note to moderators: +1 Funny. It's humor.]Paul Gillingwater
MBA, CISSP, CISM
And, from the USPTO itself: US 5794003 and US 5560028
And, for future reference: search the USPTO
Discussions such as this one are the result of the different views people have on the reasons we have patents. What is it the patent system actually tries to accomplish?
Stimulate research by allowing individuals and companies to reap the full benefits from their research, knowing that the competition will not be able to run off with the things they have laboured to invent. Patenting drugs is an example, they take considerable research and testing to develop, and their formulas should therefor be protected. However patenting gene sequences also fall under this category. Many people say that they should not be patentable, but it can be argued that they should, due to the large amount of effort involved in finding and exploiting interesting gene sequences.
Protect ideas, basically saying that if you think of something first, you have full rights to the idea. Something like the telephone, for which the technology already existed but no one had thought of this particular application yet, before Bell. Single-click buying and XOR cursor patents fall under this category as well though, patented by people who are simply the first to be faced with a trivial problem, and patent the obvious solution to that problem.
Foster innovation and competition in the marketplace, by giving startups the rights over their ideas and designs, they have the opportunity to develop their business without the competition taking their idea and crushing them. Individuals thinking up novelty items such as the "waving hand on a spring" would like their ideas protected, so that they can market and produce these items without large-scale Hong Kong and Chinese manufacturers taking their idea and flooding the market with 10 million units produced overnight. But Intel can use this as well, patenting the design for a CPU socket to lock out competition in a market they already dominate.
Which ever of these three reasons for patents you believe in (or any other reason for that matter), one can come up with both good and bad examples of patents that meet the criteria, ("Good" and "bad" being designations that most people would agree with in these cases).
In my opinion, the best solution might be to shorten patent life. If the purpose of patents is to encourage ideas to be published and used, yet allow the inventors to reap the benefits of their ideas and their work, then a shorter lifespan of patents would work well... how long does it generally take for a company to recoup monies invested in research anyway? If I have a good idea but I lack the means to develop it in the near future, is the public not better off if another company is allowed to use my idea after the patent lapses after a few years, instead of allowing me to sit on it for ages, perhaps hoping some company will discover the same idea and then spring my patent on them? I would suggest a patent lifespan of no more than a few years... but perhaps others can come up with reasons longer lifespans would be a necessity.
If construction was anything like programming, an incorrectly fitted lock would bring down the entire building...
The thing goes like this. To produce an innovation, i must spend money. And then i can get the money by orverchaging a bit when i sell the product, to compensate the R&D costs.
Now, if i want to overcharge a bit, but company B has this technology withoout any R&D, the wouldn't care to sell it cheaper (production cost + very small margin). So I can't sell my product unless i charge the same.
So I don't do that R&D and so there is no innovation. But as we already know, the patent system is doomed, because it assumes there is no cost for patent research, it asumes it's costs the same to research 1 patent, 100, 1000000, infinite number.
So at the end, it stiffles promotes innovation, but depromotes implementations/applications, and breaks the techonolical advance foundations which is built layer upon layer.
Unless you can trade cards (patent portfolio), which means only large corporations can access the technology.
In the end, you can never be sure it does more harm than good, but companies are mostly cnfortable with it, because at the end, it's a way to split the cake ($$$).
And that's what companies are about. But as it beign the perfect tool to promote innovations, i very much doubt it.
unfinished: (adj.)
Because it's worth a lot, at least $150M, that's why.
unfinished: (adj.)
The more big companies feel the pain caused by over-reaching IP claims, the faster the day will come that our "representatives" will be forced to rationalize these laws.
You were mistaken. Which is odd, since memory shouldn't be a problem for you
There is a big difference with genetics. Genes already exist in nature. The people who are patenting genes are FINDING them, not INVENTING the. The result is that they are using the patent to prevent other people from performing research on naturally occuring bio functions.
Simply having a lot of work and money involved in something does not justify enabling patents on it. You are still FINDING something that already existed. The patent system is for developing something that does not already exist.
One group patented genes that they thought were related to breast cancer. Then they prevented other groups from researching various cures for breast cancer. THAT SUCKS.
If someone developes a gene sequence from nothing, let them patent it. But if they just find an existing sequence in nature, then it should qualify as prior art and prevent the patent.
There is nothing so silly as other peoples traditions, and nothing so sacred as our own.
I just unloaded my Intergraph stock a month ago.
Oh well. I used to work in Intergraph's advanced processor division a couple a years ago. There was this designer that laid out the clipper cache for the C3/C4 processor. Well he got grabbed up by intel a few years later. Word had it, he designed part of the pent/intn cache.
Supporting World Peace Through Nuclear Pacification
Pending the final outcome of this patent infringement case, I wonder how this will affect AMD and its *hammer chip uptake in the higher-end 64-bit x86 architecture market. Should Intel lose the case, does any of this have the potential to help AMD increase market share in the 64-bit arena, whether by virtue of being a pure, innovative technology (as opposed to being ripped from someone else), or by having an advantage of already being on the market while Intel redesigns their chips? Or by having cheaper chips (by not having to tack a litigation 'tax' onto the price of processors)?
Does any of this even matter? Will AMD still be the Cinderella in the corporate eyes when this is over?
Have EVDO, will travel.
Too bad this patent doesn't keep people from reinventing it.
!#@%*)anks for hanging up the phone, dear.
They used to make high-end unix-based workstations for CAD/GIS work. The US Army Corps of Engineers and several other government agencies, as well as civil & construction engineering companies were huge customers. Demand for those workstations started to decline as PC's got more powerful and other software, like AutoCAD and ARC/INFO started to become more popular. Now, I believe, they are basically a software company. Their software is still very popular in public works & civil engineering firms. The last time I had any dealings with them was about 6 years or so ago when I went with some engineers to the Intergraph headquarters in Huntsville to help test some utilities for interfacing Microstation and ARC/INFO.
... AMD announces the acquisition of Intergraph for $400M. :-)
That is all.