FTC Dismisses Rambus Antitrust Case
Rambus off the hook for antitrust claims.
We’ve heard about how Rambus has been going around to other companies with patent claims, which has lead other memory companies believe that Rambus is engaging in anticompetitive practices. The Federal Trade Commission doesn’t seem to think so, as today it dropped its claim that Rambus violated antitrust laws in patenting technologies that were eventually incorporated into industry standards.
“We are pleased to have finally put this matter behind us,” said Thomas Lavelle, senior vice president and general counsel at Rambus. “Rambus has prevailed on similar JEDEC-related claims at the Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit, in front of a jury, and before a federal district court. The FTC’s decision to drop its remaining JEDEC-related claim against us was the right one.”
The FTC originally brought charges against Rambus in 2002 relating to the memory company’s 1992-1995 participation in an industry standard setting committee, the Joint Electron Device Engineering Council (JEDEC).
Just this past March, Hynix agreed to pay Rambus royalties and damages for memory technologies.
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Sigh, I thought it was a law suit that RAMBUS was doing that was dismissed. Really wished this one went through, they help the industry not one bit.
+1
Yhea, Rambus ought to be shut down for good, or denied court privileges at least, they just hurt the consummer with those trivial lawsuits.
Wow, RAMBUS is so irrelevent. In 1995 my PC consisted of Intel Pentium 1 75 mhz, 1 gb HDD, win 95, and I think I had 8 mb of ram.
RAMBUS - The number no. 1 company on my list of most hated. I hope they do a SCO.
Someone should ram a bus into their corporate headquarters.
They're the last thing the memory industry needs right now. I wish this case would have or could get in front of the EU, that would be interesting.
Rambus purposely tried to get technology into DDR standards that they had patents to that the others did not know about. I believe they did this so that even if their RDRAM tanked, which it did, they could turn around and say that companies making competing RAM were infringing on their patents and try to collect royalties. Sounds pretty anti competitive to me.
Rambus is like this evil zombie that never dies....
You always hope that it will somehow get turned to ashes and launched into the sun...but no...it keeps rising and jacking with things.
They are clearly pretty proud of themselves...maybe if they are so smart...they could...
1) come up with memory technology that doesn't fail
2) come up with anything new in the last 15 years that is marketable
You people know nothing about Rambus. The Memory cartel knew that Rambus patented technology was far superior to anything out there and decided to steal it instead of pay for it and drag it out in the courts for 15 years. ALL memory currently in use is based on Rambus patented technology. And as far as coming up with anything new, ever heard of XDR? Look it up moron.
icpjb sounds like a RAMBUS stockholder or employee.
I think the only product that I've used from Rambus is the XDR found in the Playstation 3. DDR is where it's at now, why bother fighting an industry standard?
I think the only product that I've used from Rambus is the XDR found in the Playstation 3. DDR is where it's at now, why bother fighting an industry standard?
That is the point, RAMBUS joined the standards group that developed DDR and proposed key bits to enable DDR to work, which was incorporated into the standard. Now that DDR is the standard, they go "Oh, by the way, we patented that tech and you all must pay us for it."
Hated there memory when it came out. Why wont they just take one for the team and just go away.
One of you super-sleuths should do some research as to what politicians Rambus makes campaign contributions to. Then you will understand the verdict...
Patents for electrical engineering and software should be eliminated or atleast severely restricted. Such things had never been conceived of when the patent system was created. Many companies like AMD that create standards and then share them for free, or atleast at a very reasonable licensing fee. Rambus patents the obvious, waits for someone to "violate" their patent, and then sues. Clearly they have insiders in the USPTO and courts, there's no other way they get away with this.
The Memory cartel knew that Rambus patented technology was far superior to anything out there and decided to steal it instead of pay for it and drag it out in the courts for 15 years. ALL memory currently in use is based on Rambus patented technology. And as far as coming up with anything new, ever heard of XDR? Look it up moron.
Right...it was so superior that Rambus decided not to use it and go with their own proprietary memory that failed. After they fell flat on their faces they took BS measures to make up for it against DDR manufacturers. "well we couldn't make money on our own so lets leech it from others that we were members with!"
Oh but wait...they have XDR!!! Which is so increadibly good and viable that it is used in...one console that has sold poorly...and likely never to see the light of day in anything else.
So in summary...haven't had a successful technology on their own...(relasing memory types that never gained remotely decent tracktion, sputtered and died doesn't count) resorted to suing others. And icpjb is slinging names because?
XDR was garbage. Rambus was garbage. Hey use this in DDR ok it works. Crap intel dumped us.
SUE EVERYONE MAKING DDR!!!! WE ARE GOING OUT OF BUSINESS!!!