I am surprised that this has not been an object of some discussion. In the infamous 2/4/11 PACER - TPL's response to Barco motion for SJ - there is this quote:

"The eleven accused products use six different microprocessors manufactured by four chip suppliers: Texas Instruments, AMCC, LSI Corporation, STMicroelectronics, and Xilinx."

Almost humorous is the fact that somebody only counted with their fingers on one hand (excluding thumb). They say "four" then list five.

The excitement level this promotes is somewhat dependent on your attitude about the MMP. Some, like myself, are under the (strong) impression that all high performance chips infringe. So this "news" came with a yawn. But some are probably less convinced. This above quote should aid in the "convincin'".

I took a little deeper look at these companies, as it would seem that there is some likelihood that most of their customers (our licensing targets) are buying products that we claim infringe the MMP.

Tid-bits from looking to their respective Web sites:

TI:

$6B in '10 revenues.
(National Semi, being bought by TI, had $1.4B)

80,000 customers world-wide. No problem typing zeros; that number is 80,000.

"Texas Instruments semiconductor innovations help 80,000 customers unlock the possibilities of the world as it could be — smarter, safer, greener, healthier and more fun."

AMCC:

Closely tied to IBM

"Also in January 2008, AppliedMicro announced an extension of its relationship with IBM Semiconductor; IBM now incorporates the AppliedMicro PowerPC 4xx product line in its Semiconductor Solutions offering. Under this expanded relationship, AppliedMicro and IBM’s Semiconductor Solutions sales forces both market AppliedMicro's PowerPC 4xx products. AppliedMicro has added customers like Accusys and Qlogic to its large customer base for its PowerPC product line."

AMCC customers plus IBM customers?

~$250M '10 revs

LSI:

$2.6B '10 revs

STMicroelectronics:

$10.35B '10 revs

Xilinx:

"Competition: During the "tech boom years," competitor Altera was the market leader. Today, Xilinx customers represent just over half of the entire programmable logic market, at 51%. Altera is Xilinx's strongest competitor with 34% of the market. Other key players in this market are Actel and Lattice Semiconductor."

Wouldn't their competitors also be probable licensing candidates?

Net revs '10: $1.8B

After having looked as per the above, I find myself a bit dumbfounded. I always figured that there are literally thousands of probable infringers. But tens of thousands? Over 100,000?

Granted, I may be getting a little ahead of myself, since I don't have a fix on how many of these companies' customers buy infringing product. But seeing TI's number of customers really raised my eyebrows, then throw in IBM, and the annual revs of the others. Perhaps this better explains the new policy of expanding Alliacense towards capturing more licensees.

Just some stuff to think about....

SGE