Good Times/Bad Times for Rambus

Last Friday, Rambus issued a press release that made it sound as if the company had been vindicated after its recent loss in a lawsuit it brought against Infineon. The U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Virginia set aside the jury verdict from the trial in May and cleared Rambus of the allegations relating to DDR SDRAM standard setting. "We are pleased that the record has been set straight on DDR SDRAM," said Geoff Tate, CEO of Rambus. "However, Rambus still intends to appeal the patent infringement case and the jury verdict on Rambus' behavior at JEDEC with regards to SDRAM. We aim to conclusively prove that Infineon is violating Rambus' patent rights and that Rambus must be justly compensated by Infineon for the use of our patents." The Court rejected Infineon's motion to enjoin Rambus from pursing further patent infringement litigation regarding Infineon's DDR SDRAM memory products while it granted a parallel request to prohibit Rambus from pursuing such litigation in the U.S. regarding Infineon's JEDEC-compliant SDRAM memory products. In addition, the Court ordered Rambus to pay for a portion of Infineon's attorney fees. Rambus says it intends to file an appeal to the Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit in Washington, DC. However, almost simultaneously, a gang of Rambus shareholders filed a suit against the company, as we've learned from The Inquirer . The suit alleges that Rambus misled investors by claiming it would collect buckets of cash by licensing SDRAM patents, which it claims it owns. The suit also claims that Rambus neglected to let owners of its stock know that it swiped knowledge about SDRAM illegally. Meanwhile, Intel isn't exactly pushing RIMMs on potential P4 users. Mobo makers are waiting with bated breath to get the go-ahead from Intel to release boards that support SDRAM . Somebody needs to take these Rambus kids aside and explain to them that winning the battle isn't the same thing as winning the war.