Rambus, Infineon Back To Court

The federal lawsuit, in which Infineon won a $3.5 million jury verdict (later reduced to $350,000) in Virginia last year, has been the subject of contentious appeals.

At issue are Rambus patent claims over SDRAM and DDR (double data rate) technology. Rambus attended meetings of a standards body in the early 1990s, where the technology was discussed, but didn't disclose it had or would seek patents.

Rambus said it did nothing wrong and has sought to charge licensing fees on the technology from other companies.

In its SEC annual report, the company reported that litigation costs last year were $27.1 million, compared with $3.8 million a year earlier.

Some memory providers in the channel said they've been spending more time focusing on day-to-day pricing issues than on the legal skirmishes.

"Other than the price of Rambus [memory being high, the market is in a major correction right now," said David Harvey, founder of Shenandoah Memory, a Churchville, Va.-based memory provider. "It's not going to be long before they are all going to be competitive price-wise. I'm sure if [Rambus wins, it will affect the market, but I'm really not sure how."