These 2 example of reference validates patent enforcibility during reexam process.

From RAMBUS earning call transcript april,2010

Tom Lavelle

Thanks, Harold, and good afternoon everyone. For the legal update, let’s start with the ITC. The ITC’s administrative law judge found three Rambus patents were infringed by NVIDIA and not invalid, two Rambus patents were infringed, but found invalid by Judge Essex. Both sides filed petitions for review by the full commission in this matter and the commission decided to review validity issues with respect to all five patents, but not the administrative law judge’s finding of infringement. We expect to file the termination by the commission on or about May 24th of this year.

Turning to the coordinated appeals of the Hynix and Micron cases, our argument was heard before the Court of Appeals for the federal circuit on April 5th in Washington DC. The issue is being discussed where Hynix has appealed of $397 million judgment against them, and our appeal of the Micron Delaware decision. Given the timing and the fact that Chief Judge Michel is expected to retire soon, we are expecting the results of this hearing sooner than usual, possibly as early as the end of May. We are confident in our arguments and look forward to the outcome.

Moving now to the price fixing case in San Francisco, we continue to have free trial hearings before Judge Kramer where various are being discussed. Judge Kramer has yet to reset a trial date as issues remain relative to our Samsung settlement. We continue to seek a trial date so we can begin the process of presenting our case to the jury. There have been a number of updates over the past quarter relative to the re-exams in the United States Patent and Trademark Office. Some of the latest involves re-exams of certain Farmwald-Horowitz patents that were at issue in the Hynix and Micron cases. The US PTO has issued a notice of intent to reissue a certification, re-examining certificate confirming certain claims in the 105 patent, including one claim that was found infringed and valid in the Hynix case. This essentially concludes the re-exam proceedings relative to this patent.

Also, the PTO issued an advisory office action and re-examination proceedings for the 918 patent. The advisory office action essentially confirms two claims within the patent that were found valid and infringed by Hynix, but maintained a rejection of another claim within the patent. And just today, we learned that the US PTO has issued a re-examination certificate on our 195 patent, a Farmwald-Horowitz patent as well also asserted in some of our cases, where all of our claims were confirmed by the US PTO.

As we said many times, the re-exam process is a long one with multiple iterations of briefs and responses. It’s important to remember that our patents remain valid and enforceable during the entire process. That’s it for the legal update, and next I will turn the call back to Satish.

Administrative Law Judge Rules in Favor of Knowles on the Issue of Patent Infringement by Analog Devices, Inc.

WASHINGTON--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Judge Rogers of the International Trade Commission issued his Initial Determination holding that certain MEMS microphone products of Analog Devices are covered by the language of Knowles’ U.S. Patents 6,781,231 and 7,242,089, ruling against Analog Devices on the issue of infringement.

“The Judge made the right decision by ruling in favor of Knowles Electronics on the issue of infringement. This ruling is consistent with our view of the merits of this case.”

Jeffrey Niew, Chief Executive Officer of Knowles Electronics, stated that, “The Judge made the right decision by ruling in favor of Knowles Electronics on the issue of infringement. This ruling is consistent with our view of the merits of this case.”

For the time being, Analog Devices will be able to import products into the United States, due to the Judge’s ruling on the issue of validity. In response to this ruling, Mike Adell, VP and General Manager, stated, “We are obviously disappointed in the Judge’s finding and will be requesting that the ITC Commission review this issue. Despite this ruling, Knowles has and will continue to develop innovative solutions for our customers. Protection of these solutions and intellectual property from unlawful infringement is of great importance to our business, and we will pursue all available remedies in order to do so."

The patents remain valid and enforceable before the U.S. Courts, and are part of a large international portfolio of patents and pending applications which are related to Knowles’ award-winning microphone package technologies. Pete Loeppert, Chief Technical Officer of Knowles Acoustics, added, “Although these patents are currently under review by the Patent Office, some of our patent claims have not been attacked and their validity is, accordingly, confirmed. The re-examination process has also afforded us the opportunity to add additional claims to strengthen our patent positions. We are confident that once the re-examination process is complete, the Patent Office will confirm its original finding of validity on the limited claims that had been rejected, and that all claims of the Knowles patents will be confirmed as valid and enforceable.”