by Anton Shilov
04/07/2003 | 03:58 PM
Intel Corporation and VIA Technologies announced today that they have reached a settlement agreement in a series of pending patent lawsuits related to chipsets and microprocessors. The agreement encompasses 11 pending cases in five countries involving 27 patents.
<%BANNER[article]%>Under terms of the settlement both companies will dismiss all pending legal claims in all jurisdictions. The companies also entered into a ten-year patent cross-license agreement covering each company's products. As part of the agreement Intel granted VIA a license to sell microprocessors that are compatible with the x86 instruction set but not pin compatible or bus compatible with Intel microprocessors.
Intel further agreed for a period of three years, not to assert its patents on VIA bus or pin compatible microprocessors. Intel also granted VIA a four year license to design and sell chip sets that are compatible with the Intel microprocessor bus and agreed not to assert its patents on VIA or its customers or distributors on such chip sets for a fifth year. The agreement will be royalty bearing to Intel for some products. The license agreements do not apply to S3 Graphics, a company partially owned by VIA.
Each company is responsible for its own attorney's fees. Specific financial and other terms of the agreement were not disclosed.
Take a look at our news-stories dedicated to legal action between VIA and Intel:
Intel vs. VIA: the Lawsuit Begins
The Mainboard Makers Welcome VIA's Lawsuit against Intel
VIA Sues Intel for Patent Infringement
VIA to Get Intel's Blessing?
In the Midst of the Legal War VIA Wins a Legal Battle against Intel
With the settlement of the lawsuit VIA’s sales are very likely to skyrocket tremendously since the only thing that prevents potentially successful VIA’s chipsets for the Pentium 4 platform, such as VIA PT400, PT600 and PT800, from becoming strong sellers was the legal complaint between Intel and VIA. With the legal action ended, mainboard makers will start to utilise VIA’s products, what will eventually cause the prices on platforms to drop and that is an extremely good thing for all of us.