back to article Intel hits AMD with patent breach claim

AMD piled more worries on its shareholders and partners today when it revealed that Intel is threatening to pull a 2001 cross-licensing agreement between the two firms. In an SEC filing, AMD said it had received "correspondence" from Intel relating to the firm's 2001 Patent Cross License Agreement, which "(i) alleges that the …

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  1. Don Mitchell

    Taking lessions from Microsoft?

    I admire Intel for its technology, but their blatent attempts to drive a competator out of business is an open inventation to aggressive anti-trust action.

  2. Heff
    Unhappy

    only now says hate?

    what did it say before? Battered-wife-loving? jailhouse-loving?

    @Don. wont happen. if Intel cant score an antitrust suit after basically paying OEMS and resellers advertising costs in full when they feature that fucking annoying intel jingle in their TV spots, and threatening to dick with OEM supplies of new chips if they start selling AMD as well, its never going to happen.

    they'll just do to AMD what they did to transmeta ; rape their intellectual property, hammer them with anticompetitive marketing practices, file frivolous lawsuits to drain their available cash, and if a judge ever does manage to catch up to them, they drag it out for as long as is possible before finally copping to some 100-million dollar fine for effectively putting the competition into administration.

    100+million dollars to effectively cripple AMD is small change for industrial sabotage for a business with an operating income of 9 billion dollars a year.

  3. Richard Tobin

    Nvidia?

    Perhaps they are worried that this is how Nvidia is going to get a licence to make x86s.

  4. J

    Not good...

    I've heard somewhere AMD is in quite some danger of going bankrupt. This won't help, I'd say.

  5. A J Stiles
    Paris Hilton

    Use Standard Response

    Don't patent lawyers have a standard letter for these situations, in which they calmly assert that the "patent" in question is null and void; even if it had a shred of validity, they would not be infringing on it anyway; and in case of any doubt refer to Arkell v. Pressdram?

    I know I would.

    Paris, because I know I would .....

  6. Ian Michael Gumby
    Coat

    Intel has to walk a very thin tightrope...

    Without actually seeing the cross patent licensing agreement, we're going to have to assume that Intel has a case. At least enough of a case that they can proceed ahead with discovery.

    The real key is to understand what Intel is trying to protect. From the article, the issue isn't that AMD spun off their chip foundries but that they brought in a partner (Abu Dhabi).

    Intel wants to make sure that Abu Dhabi isn't getting rights to re-distribute their IP and are using the joint venture to get around the road blocks that protect Intel's IP.

    You can bet that Intel and AMD settle this in the near future by not allowing further transfer of Intel's IP.

    On the flip side, Intel can't be too agressive because the lawsuit could be seen as an anti-competitive move.

    While there can be some comparisons to Transmeta, AMD is not in the same boat. Splitting off their foundries actually makes AMD more competitive by allowing their foundries to perform custom third party chip manufacturing.

  7. Anonymous Coward
    Flame

    I admire Intel for its technology......

    I admire Intel for its technology..... really? Why. The x86 range of processors have been crap. Wasnt until recently that the chip have moved on. Compare their processors with their rivals Motorolla and the PowerRISC chip, their stuff looked silly.

    x86 was responsible for the OS manufacturers having to write completely crippled operating systems due to the sheer dumbness of the whole designs. Remember having to page memory....???

    So crap were Intel that a 3rd party company, AMD, created better performing compatible chips. That is a huge undertaking and yet AMD did it.

    Now finally, I think Intel is making the better processors. But its taken 15 years and I think it needed AMDs existance for Intel to up their game.

    The funniest thing, is that if you want to compile in 64 bit on the Microsoft platform, you need to the /AMD switch - man that must nigle Intel lol....

    We NEED AMD here to keep Intel Honest.

  8. Rob Beard

    iAMD64

    Okay but don't AMD provide a licence for Intel to create chips which use AMD64 (or EM64T)?

    Surely if Intel revoked AMD's x86 licence then AMD could revoke Intel's AMD64 licence so they'd both be up the creek then (okay, Intel more than AMD).

    Rob

  9. Ken Hagan Gold badge
    Happy

    Re: iAMD64

    "Surely if Intel revoked AMD's x86 licence then AMD could revoke Intel's AMD64 licence so they'd both be up the creek then (okay, Intel more than AMD)."

    Not as much as Microsoft. Macs have been ported before and could doubtless be ported again. Linux is positively promiscuous. Windows? Well I suppose there's ia64...

  10. Anonymous Coward
    Black Helicopters

    Intel are not in the lawsuit business.

    AMD have more than enough dirt to pull on intel: "Ooh look, you copied our [insert_tech_here]!" Even though the probably both just came up with the same solution and one beat the other to the patent office.

    They will settle out of court and with no money exchanging hands. I mean, how much of intel EM64T is derived from amd64...

  11. alzain
    Thumb Up

    Intel vs amd

    Oi intel u overgrown slime ball.Amd aint violating any terms or whatever so put your slimey butt down and relax...............................Amd will one day be the king and intel will be the servent..i dont read this page twice so dont throw any @'s at me

  12. al
    Paris Hilton

    It's just angry lovemaking...

    ... between the estranged couple AMD-in-tel. (now you who wears the pants in x86 family)...

    Mrs.x86 just doesn't want Mr.x86 to look outside and even try flirting with new chick on the block (nvidia).

    Paris, hmmm, coz she won't mind a 3some.

  13. adam
    Flame

    Oh please........

    Intel have always been a bully so this doesn't surprise me.

    I for one hope AMD wins this latest lawsuit, if AMD weren't around Intel would have a ticket to do whatever they like.

  14. Gis Bun
    Happy

    On their toes

    AMD must stay alive just to keep Intel on their toes.

    Me personally, my last 2 systems have been AMD based. AMD works well and is cheaper. Why go to Intel.

  15. BioTube
    Boffin

    About EM64T

    It IS derived from AMD64, with things related to HyperTransfer removed. Intel did develop its own x86-64 extensions, but chose not to enable them(processors that had them built in had them physically disabled) in favor of the Itanic. We know next to nothing about Intel's abandoned x86-64 line.

  16. Anonymous Coward
    Flame

    Patented Commodities?

    Now wait a minute. We have been told for years now that the way to go is with "Industry Standard" "commodity hardware". What's all this about exclusive control and intellectual property?

    See -- that is why we don't use those bad old "proprietary" processors from HP, IBM, Sun, etc.

    Granted, the Linux Commodity OS really only targets the Intel Commodity Hardware. So what are the other suppliers of Commodity OS and Hardware that we can go to to avoid the Monopolistic Intel? None? You mean we're stuck with them? Linux is the only real Commodity OS and we can have no other?

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