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Memory Morass: Micron Sues Rambus

Two RAM makers square off in court over technology and patent issues.

Terho Uimonen, IDG News Service

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Micron Technology, one of the world's largest memory chip makers, announced Monday that it has filed suit against high-speed memory interface technology developer Rambus.

The lawsuit, filed in the U.S. District Court in Delaware, asserts violations of Federal antitrust laws, and also invalidity, non-infringement, and non-enforceability of Rambus' patents, the Boise, Idaho-based memory supplier said in a brief statement.

Although the Micron statement did not go into any further detail, it is likely that the suit is aimed at making invalid recent patent claims over key memory chip technologies by Rambus. Micron and Rambus officials could not immediately be reached for comment.

Mountain View, California-based Rambus has said that it holds patents that allow it to receive royalty payments from all manufacturers of some of the most common memory types used in computers, including SDRAM and DDR SDRAM as well as Rambus DRAM memory chips.

Japanese memory chip manufacturers Hitachi Ltd. and Toshiba are among the major memory manufacturers who have already signed agreements to comply with Rambus's claims.

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