VIA Announces Total Victory in Lawsuit with Intel Relating to K7 Chipset Products

[NFS4]

For Immediate Release

VIA Announces Total Victory in Lawsuit with Intel Relating to K7 Chipset
Products

Intel Dismisses Last Remaining Claim

Taipei, Taiwan, 14 December 2001, - VIA Technologies, Inc., a leading
innovator and developer of core logic chipsets, microprocessors, and
multimedia and communications chips, today announced that it has prevailed
fully in the lawsuit filed by Intel Corporation in July 2000 in which Intel
alleged that VIA's AMD K7-compatible chipsets infringed four Intel patents.

In July 2001, Intel dismissed all claims relating to one of the four patents
asserted against VIA's K7 chipsets. Intel's allegations relating to the
three remaining patents had been scheduled for trial in the Northern
District of California in January 2002. However, as has been reported
previously, on November 20, 2001, the U.S. District Court granted summary
judgment in VIA's favor with respect to one of those patents on the grounds
that VIA was licensed to the patent under the Accelerated Graphics Port 2.0
license agreement that Intel made available to the industry and which VIA
had executed. On December 4, 2001, the Court granted summary judgment in
VIA's favor with respect to another of the patents on the grounds that Intel
had not proven that VIA infringed the patent.

The Court was scheduled to hear VIA's motion for summary judgment of
invalidity regarding the last remaining patent on December 13, 2001.
However, on December 11, 2001, Intel dismissed its claims relating to that
patent. The dismissal terminates all litigation between VIA and Intel
relating to VIA's K7 chipsets. While VIA has dismissed its counterclaims
against Intel, no payments of any kind have been made to Intel in connection
with Intel's dismissal of its remaining claim. VIA will not pay a royalty,
and its K7 chipset products are no longer subject to a possible injunction
arising from this litigation.

"We could not be more delighted with this result," commented Wen-Chi Chen,
CEO and President of VIA Technologies, Inc. "We believed from the outset
that Intel's claims against our K7 chipsets were driven by marketing
concerns rather than legal issues, and the Court's orders granting summary
judgment for VIA and Intel's dismissal of its last claim validate this
belief. Our engineering and legal teams did a great job so that we remain
free to continue our thriving K7 chipset business."

Lawsuits between the parties regarding VIA's Pentium* 4-compatible chipsets
remain pending, as does VIA's lawsuit in Texas alleging that Intel's
Pentium* 4 microprocessor infringes a patent owned by VIA and its Centaur
subsidiary. Said Mr. Chen, "Our hope is that our differences with Intel
regarding the Pentium* 4 can be resolved short of protracted litigation like
the case we just won. Competition should be in the marketplace, not in the
courtroom."


About VIA Technologies, Inc.
VIA Technologies, Inc. is a leading innovator and developer of PC core logic
chipsets, microprocessors, and multimedia and communications chips. VIA
delivers value to the PC industry by designing, marketing, and selling
high-performance VIA Apollo core logic chipsets for the full range of PC
platforms, and cost-effective VIA C3(tm) processors for Value PCs and
Internet Appliances, as well as developing complete solutions for the PC
platform through its VPSD Business Unit. Its customers include the world's
top OEMs, mainboard manufacturers, and system integrators. VIA is
headquartered in Taipei, Taiwan, at the center of the Greater China
high-tech manufacturing engine, and has branch offices in the US, China and
Europe. The company is listed on the Taiwan Stock Exchange (TSE2388), and
achieved annual revenues of nearly US$1 billion in 2000. Additional
information can be found at www.via.com.tw.

 

[Dogmeat]

VIA should sue for loss of revenue and legal fees. Chipzilla can keep the competition tied up for long periods of time in legal transactions and meanwhile develope their own solution and get ahead in the market. Thats unfair competition.

 

[sandorski]

Does Intel ever win these cases?

 

[AGodspeed]

Does Intel ever win these cases?

It seems like Intel is always losing their court cases (based on what I've read in the last few years, especially in the last couple months). Just as an example, didn't Intel sue Cyrix like 4 times and lose every single one? Anyone who can comment otherwise is welcome to discuss this.

Also, what were the terms of the lawsuit. Was it that Intel didn't want AMD to get support for the Athlon or was it that VIA's K7 chipsets "infringed" on some of Intel's chipset patents?

 

[Midnight Rambler]

<< Also, what were the terms of the lawsuit. Was it that Intel didn't want AMD to get support for the Athlon or was it that VIA's K7 chipsets "infringed" on some of Intel's chipset patents? >>

The text that NFS4 quoted provides your answer ... your second guess was the correct one.

This is the small potatoes case for Intel though, the P4-related cases are the ones they are most interested in. Those cases are much stronger, whereas these cases were pretty easy to lose since it involved patents that were essentially "open" (ie. free) to others except for VIA. And shoot, you never know, their dropping this final K7-related suit may all be part of the ongoing negotiations for the P4 cases. These cases are like big league sports deals, you never know what tricks each party may bring to the table, both sides are constantly throwing offers back and forth, and even bitter enemies oftentimes play quid pro quo. And if you follow the semi industry as whole, there's few companies that aren't involved in litigations, on either end or both.

 

[MadRat]

I don't so much think that Intel loses all of their lawsuits as much as the lawyers muddle up the arguments because they do not understand the technology. Its hard to be an expert when you don't know the terminology or intimate protocols of the industry.