Intellectual Ventures Reaches Patent Deal with Chip Makers ...

By Ashby Jones

Intellectual Ventures, the Seattle-area giant known for buying up patents and licensing them out, has settled a handful of patent lawsuits over DRAM and NAND Flash memory with two defendants: Korea-based SK Hynix Inc . and Japan-based Elpida Memory Inc.

Terms of the deal weren?t disclosed.

But the news still warrants some attention because it involves IV, which throughout most of its 12-year history, has managed to make piles of money outside the courtroom by aggressively licensing patents in its portfolio to perceived infringers.

All that changed in late 2010, when IV decided to make use of the courts. One of its first cases, brought in December of that year in federal court in Delaware, was against SK Hynix and Elpida over five patents related to memory chips. IV later brought claims over five other patents against two companies in the?International Trade Commission and in the Western District of Washington.

On Monday, IV announced that it had settled all three matters with both companies. ?It?s an incredible validation of the strength of our semiconductor-patent portfolio,? said Melissa Finocchio, IV?s chief litigation counsel, in a call with the Law Blog. ?I think all of the sides were quite happy with the settlement.?

An email to an SK Hynix spokesman was not immediately returned. We also left a message with a spokesman at Micron Technology , which is in the process of acquiring Elpida (and where, incidentally, Ms. Finocchio used to work before coming to IV).

According to Ms. Finocchio, IV has six other cases pending.

LB nomenclature note:?This much is certain: IV is big, powerful and secretive. What?s less certain: the right shorthand descriptor for the company. IV calls itself an ?invention investment firm.? Other names that get bandied about for firms that buy up patents and license or sue over them include ?non-practicing entity,? (NPE) ?patent aggregation firm,? ?patent assertion entity,? and, of course, ?patent troll.?

We?re sure at some point one appellation will emerge as the winner, but for now, it?s still open to debate. Lots of debate. To some, practically every patent plaintiff is a ?troll.? To others, trolls are a mere subset of ?non-practicing entities.? To some, NPEs and aggregators are the same thing. To others, differences exist. It?s enough to make our head hurt.

Source: Wall Street Journal

Source: http://justasklegal.com/intellectual-ventures-reaches-patent-deal-with-chip-makers/6691/

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