And INTEL understands the value of a patent portfolio.

Intel Corp. has agreed to pay Advanced Micro Devices Inc. (AMD) $1.25 billion.

And when you consider the size of these settlements, it makes EDIG raising the bar to $5 million seem like a pittance.

I hope DM really turns up the heat as these companies understand the ramifications of taking things too far.

Samsung Electronics Settles Patent Infringement Litigation with Rambus; Will Pay $200 Million

January 21, 2010 - Samsung Electronics Co. and Rambus, Inc. have settled all patent litigation between the two companies.

The patents under which Samsung will be taking a license cover all of Samsung's semiconductor products.

Under the terms of the agreement, Samsung will pay $200 million to Rambus, plus buy $200 million of Rambus' shares and make $25 million quarterly royalty payments to the memory-chip designer for the next five years under a patent license.

But that's not all: the two companies will also collaborate on a new generation of memory technologies, beginning with graphics and mobile memory chips and possibly moving on to server and high-speed NAND flash-memory chips used in MP3 players and digital cameras.

Motorola and VTech Settle Patent Infringement Litigation

January 18, 2010 - Motorola Inc. and VTech Communications, Inc. announced that they have settled a patent lawsuit that Motorola filed against VTech in the Eastern District of Texas.

The six patents in suit related to cordless telephone technology. VTech is primarily known as a supplier of corded and cordless phones and electronic learning toys.

The terms of the settlement are confidential.

Kodak and Samsung Settle Patent Infringement Litigation

January 12, 2010 - Eastman Kodak Co. announced yesterday that they have signed a patent licensing agreement with Samsung Electronics Co. of South Korea.

The settlement ends 14 months of patent infringement lawsuits that the companies had filed against each other, as well as patent infringement proceedings before the International Trade Commission.

Kodak's 2008 lawsuit against Samsung alleged that camera phones imported by Samsung violated some of Kodak's many patents. With over 1,000 patents on digital imaging technology, almost all of today's digital cameras use some aspect of Kodak's patented technology.

Samsung filed a patent infringement complaint of its own with the ITC in February 2009, claiming that Kodak's digital cameras infringed some of its patents. However, a trade commission judge ruled Dec. 17 that Samsung had infringed two Kodak patents. That jumpstarted negotiations between the two companies, and they reached a cross-licensing agreement in December.

Acacia Research Corp. Division Loses Patent Infringement Lawsuit Against Verizon Wireless and Other Carriers

December 24, 2009 - Last week, a jury in the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Virginia found that Verizon Wireless and other wireless carriers did not infringe the patent of DNT LLC, a unit of Acacia Research Corp.

The patent was filed in 1990 and relates to automatic dialing - specifically, an improved auto-dialer for touchtone phones. In this lawsuit, the patented technology was allegedly infringed by the way wireless modem cards access the carriers' networks.

The jury also found that the patent was invalid for three reasons: it lacked an adequate written description of the claimed invention, it was not enabling, and it would have been obvious as of the date of the patent application's filing.

Intel Settles Patent Infringement Lawsuit with AMD for $1.25 Billion

November 15, 2009 - Following years of antitrust and patent disputes, Intel Corp. has agreed to pay Advanced Micro Devices Inc. (AMD) $1.25 billion.

Under the deal, AMD will withdraw its antitrust complaints against Intel in Europe, the U.S., Japan and South Korea. But the European Union has already issued a ruling that ordered Intel to pay a $1.45 billion fine for "anticompetitive behavior." And in the U.S., there is speculation that the Federal Trade Commission may be close to filing their own case against Intel.

Meanwhile, though Intel still controls about 80% of the microprocessor market, its competitor AMD will get a welcome boost from the settlement money - and from the "oversight provisions that will make it difficult for Intel to violate," according to AMD exec Thomas McCoy.

Motorola Settles with Aruba in Patent Infringement Lawsuit

November 9, 2009 - Motorola prevailed in its patent dispute against WLAN vendor Aruba Networks, who agreed to a one-time payment of $19.8 million to Motorola and its subsidiaries, Symbol Technologies and Wireless Valley Communications.

Motorola and its subsidiaries filed suit against Aruba in August 2007 over technology related to wireless computer networks. Aruba filed a countersuit a year later, and on Friday, November 6, the parties announced that they had settled all outstanding disputes out of court and reached a cross-licensing agreement.

Prolific Patent Holder Ronald A. Katz Settles with UPS

October 7, 2009 - United Parcel Service, Inc. and Ronald A. Katz Technology Licensing, L.P. announced that they have settled the lawsuit Katz's company filed in 2007 over Katz Technology's patents related to interactive voice applications.

Katz has a portfolio of over 50 patents with thousands of patent claims, all related to various aspects of telephonic interactive voice applications. His company has filed more than 100 lawsuits against major companies, and many have settled - including American Express, Bank of America, IBM, Merck, Microsoft, Wachovia and now UPS.

UPS has agreed to pay an undisclosed sum for a nonexclusive license for Katz Technology's patents related to interactive voice applications used in UPS' Travel and Transportation services. Other terms of the license were not disclosed.

Sprint Nextel Settles Patent Infringement Lawsuit with Small Local Phone Company

October 5, 2009 - Telecom giant Sprint Nextel Corp. has settled a patent infringement lawsuit it filed against Big River Telephone Co., a small phone company based in Cape Girardeau, Missouri.

Sprint sued Big River and three other companies in January 2008 over the infringement of Sprint's patents for sending telephone calls over the Internet.

Financial terms of the settlement between Sprint and Big River are confidential, but Sprint said Big River agreed to pay for a non-exclusive license to use the patents-in-suit.

In Appeals Court, Microsoft Scores Delay of Injunction on Word Sales

September 7, 2009 - In a hearing on Friday, September 4, the US Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit (CAFC) approved Microsoft's request to put the injunction against sales of its Word software on hold.

At issue in the suit is i4i's patented technology related to the use of XML (extensible markup language) as a way of encoding data for use in exchanging information between different programs.

The US District Court for the Eastern District of Texas had ordered the injunction as part of its judgment against Microsoft in the patent infringement lawsuit filed against the software giant by Canadian company i4i. I4i LP v. Microsoft Corp., 07cv113, U.S. District Court, Eastern District of Texas (Tyler).

The CAFC noted that, in allowing the injunction to be delayed, it was acting “without prejudicing the ultimate determination of this case.”

DISH Network, EchoStar Ordered to Pay Another $200M to TiVo in Patent Infringement Lawsuit

September 7, 2009 - On September 4, it was announced that the US District Court, Eastern District of Texas ordered DISH and EchoStar to pay an additional $200M to TiVo as a result of what TiVo called "contempt sanction for continued violation of a Court-ordered permanent injunction."

In June 2009, the same court found EchoStar in contempt of court and ordered EchoStar to pay $103M plus interest, in addition to an existing $104M award, to TiVo. The suit began when TiVo sued EchoStar and DISH in 2004 for patent infringement related to digital video recording.

SAP Ordered to Pay Versata $138.6M in Patent Infringement Lawsuit

September 1, 2009 - Enterprise software provider SAP has been ordered by a federal court to pay $138.6 million to Versata Software, a Texas-based company.

SAP's Business Suite products and other services was found to have infringed 5 Versata patents related to methods for configuring systems, pricing products in multilevel product and organizational groups, and multisource transaction processing.

Microsoft Granted Expedited Hearing in i4i Patent Infringement Lawsuit

August 23, 2009 - After filing a motion on August 18 to stay the injunction on its sales of Word - the result of a patent infringement lawsuit with i4i - Microsoft received a court date for its appeal. A three-judge panel at the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit (CAFC) will hear Microsoft's appeal beginning on September 23.

Microsoft has until August 25 to file a briefing with its main arguments, said Microsoft spokesman Kevin Kutz. i4i will then be allowed to respond, and Microsoft will have the chance to file its own response to i4i before oral arguments begin.

The injunction, if allowed to stand, would take effect on October 10.

Besides the injunction on selling Word in its current form, the ruling by Judge Leonard Davis of the District Court for the Eastern District of Texas also awarded the plaintiff, i4i Inc. or Toronto, more than $290 million in damages.

Microsoft Files Emergency Motion to Stop Ban on Word Sales

August 19, 2009 - Several days after a federal judge in Texas handed down a ruling that would ban the sale of Microsoft Word within 60 days, Microsoft filed an emergency motion on August 14 in an attempt to stop the ban.

The actual document was filed under seal and has not been made public.

Judge Leonard Davis had found Microsoft liable for infringement of Canadian company i4i's patent related to "manipulation of the architecture and content of a document, particularly for data representation and transformations." Microsoft was ordered to pay $290 million.

Texas Judge Files Injunction Barring Microsoft from Selling Word

August 12, 2009 - Judge Leonard Davis of the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Texas ordered a permanent injunction yesterday that, if it stands, will prohibit Microsoft from selling Word within the next 60 days. Microsoft has also been ordered to pay more than $290 million to the patent owner, Canadian firm i4i.

Judge Davis issued the injunction following a jury trial earlier this year that found that Microsoft had infringed i4i's patent, which relates to the use of XML documents. XML is an intrinsic part of the Microsoft Word software program, and allows formatting of text and makes files readable in different programs.

Microsoft said in a statement that it will appeal the injunction.

"We are disappointed by the court's ruling," said Microsoft spokesperson Kevin Kutz in an understatement. "We believe the evidence clearly demonstrated that we do not infringe and that the i4i patent is invalid. We will appeal the verdict."

Abbott Labs to Pay J&J $1.67 Billion from Patent Infringement Lawsuit

July 2, 2009 - In the most expensive verdict in US history, Johnson & Johnson announced on June 29 that its patent infringement lawsuit against Abbott Labs was successful and that Abbott had been ordered to pay $1.67 billion ($1.17 billion in lost profits and $504 million in royalties) for infringing the patent on J&J's drug Remicade with its own drug Humira.

Both drugs treat rheumatoid arthritis, from which 1.3 million Americans suffer. The verdict was decided by a jury in the Eastern District of Texas.

The lawsuit against Abbott was filed in April 2007 by J&J's Centocor Ortho Biotech Inc. division and New York University, which has granted Centocor an exclusive license to the patent. Abbott is expected to appeal the decision.

Microsoft Ordered to Pay Canadian Company i4i $200M in Patent Infringement Lawsuit

May 26, 2009 - A jury has ruled that Microsoft must pay $200 million to Canadian software company i4i as a "reasonable royalty" for infringing i4i's U.S. patent 5,787,449.

The patent-in-suit covers a method for "manipulating the architecture and the content of a document separately from each other" and Microsoft used the patented technology in certain versions of Word 2003 and 2007.

According to Bloomberg, the $200M verdict is the fourth largest jury verdict in the United States this year to date and the second-largest jury award in a patent infringement lawsuit.

Toshiba Files Patent Infringement Lawsuit against Imation, Several Others over Recordable DVD Patents

May 14, 2009 - Japanese company Toshiba Corp. has filed suit in the U.S. District Court for the Western District of Wisconsin against Imation and several other manufacturers and distributors of recordable DVDs.

Toshiba's suit says the defendants do not have licensing agreements with Toshiba for its patents relating to DVD format specifications, and the company is seeking damages for past infringement.

Besides Toshiba, the other defendants are Moser Baer India Ltd., CMC Magnetics Corp. and Ritek Corp. of Taiwan, and Glyphics Media, Hotan Corp., Khypermedia Corp. and Advanced Media Inc. in the United States.