Intel accused of patent infringement in Core 2 Duo by Wisconsin tech transfer office

The complaint identifies the Intel Core 2 Duo microarchitecture as supposedly infringing US Patent No. 5,781,752, "Table Based Data Speculation Circuit for Parallel Processing Computer."

By Ann Steffora Mutschler, Senior Editor -- Electronic News, 2/8/2008

Technology transfer office Wisconsin Alumni Research Foundation (WARF) announced Wednesday it has filed a patent infringement lawsuit against Intel Corp for alleged patent infringement of a University of Wisconsin-Madison invention that significantly improves the efficiency and speed of computer processing.

WARF’s complaint identifies the Intel Core 2 Duo microarchitecture as infringing its US Patent No. 5,781,752, “Table Based Data Speculation Circuit for Parallel Processing Computer.”

The complaint was filed in the U.S. District Court for the Western District of Wisconsin to try to ensure that the interests of the UW-Madison and its inventors are protected and that WARF receives the compensation to which it is entitled for Intel's unlicensed use of the invention, WARF said. The compensation would be used to advance continued research at the university.

The technology at the heart of this suit was patented in 1998 and developed by four researchers at the UW-Madison, including Professor Gurindar Sohi, currently the chair of the university’s computer science department.

Noting that Intel has aggressively marketed the benefits of this invention as a feature of its Core 2 technology, Michael Falk, WARF general counsel said in a statement, “The technology significantly enhances opportunities for instruction level parallelism in modern processors, thereby increasing their execution speed.”

Specifically, WARF said its patent discloses and claims a data speculation circuit that facilitates the advanced execution of instructions before other instructions on which they may be data dependent, resulting in improved execution efficiency and speed, for which the UW-Madison researchers have been widely recognized for as a pioneering invention.

Further, Falk said WARF contacted Intel in 2001 and made repeated attempts, including meeting face-to-face with company representatives, to offer legal licensing opportunities for the technology.

“We are disappointed with Intel’s lack of response in resolving this matter, and while we were not anxious to use the courts to enforce our patent rights, we have no other recourse given our duty to protect the intellectual property of our inventors and the university,” he asserted.

WARF is asking the court to declare that Intel is infringing on its patent, to enjoin Intel from selling the product, to order Intel to pay damages to WARF and cover WARF's legal fees.

An Intel spokesman confirmed the company has been served with the complaint and that it is being evaluated. The chip giant also confirmed that it has been in discussions with WARF for more than a year.

http://www.edn.com/article/CA6530464.html