Intel has won another patent dispute with VLSI - the claim was cancelled

The history of interaction between Intel and VLSI Technology knows several defeats of the former, as a result of patent disputes only last year the processor giant had to pay the opponent more than $3 billion.
A Delaware court had to consider another VLSI lawsuit against Intel over patent infringement by the first of the parties, but the disputants came to an agreement in pre-trial order and without cash payments.Image source: IntelIt was reported by Reuters with reference to the decision of the judiciary.
Earlier it was reported that VLSI demanded more than $4 billion in damages from Intel, but now it refuses the claims and their re-submission.
VLSI is refusing to prosecute Intel's partners and suppliers on the five patents in the lawsuit.
No cash payment is involved in such a decision.Intel has recently built its defense in disputes with VLSI on attempts to clarify the structure of the owners of this company and the ultimate beneficiaries of the corresponding lawsuits.
Earlier this month, Intel representatives had just asked the court to dismiss the case due to the complex ownership structure of VLSI, which does not allow to objectively assess the degree of interest of the ultimate beneficiaries in the outcome of the case.
The dismissal of the dispute implies that VLSI will now not have to further disclose the company's ownership by next January.
North Carolina is due for another trial in the patent law dispute between VLSI and Intel in 2024.

Intel fined $950 million for infringing one of VLSI's patents in Skylake processors

A jury in Texas has issued a verdict that Intel must pay VLSI Technology a $948.8 million fine for infringing a patent related to computer chips.
Source image: intel.comVLSI, which owns the patent, is affiliated with Fortress Investment Group, a SoftBank Group conglomerate.
In a six-day lawsuit, the plaintiff claimed that Intel's Cascade Lake and Skylake processors violate its patent related to data processing technology.
A representative of Intel said that the company \"strongly disagrees\" with the verdict and intends to appeal, and the case is \"one of many examples that show that the U.S.
patent system needs urgent reform\".In March of last year, VLSI won the patent litigation with Intel, in which the Texas court ordered the processor manufacturer to pay the plaintiff $2.18 billion - later the defendant filed an appeal, but without success.
In April VLSI lost another patent dispute with Intel.
At the last hearing the plaintiff's lawyer said that Intel's processors produce \"millions and millions of violations per second\".
Intel's representative insisted that the company's engineers developed all the solutions themselves and that the manufacturer's current processors no longer work with the outdated technology that VLSI is talking about.Two more VLSI cases against Intel are pending: in Northern California and Delaware.
The California case is due to begin in 2024.

Arm responded to Qualcomm's counterclaim: licensing scheme will not change

British processor developer Arm, owned by Japanese conglomerate Softbank, filed a response to Qualcomm's counterclaim, rejecting all statements and accusations by the American company.
The company has no plans to change its licensing scheme.Image source: community.arm.comIn August Arm sued Qualcomm, which was the result of a dispute over the licensing of processor architecture.
Qualcomm responded with unexpected accusations against the British partner: according to the defendant, Arm in this way is revenge for its position against the failed merger with NVIDIA, and to consolidate its position the company allegedly decided to change the processor licensing scheme to the detriment of all chip makers - payments will be charged from manufacturers of end devices.Arm denied all these allegations and in its response to the counterclaim stressed that the essence of its claims is simple: when Qualcomm bought startup Nuvia, which was a licensee of Arm, the buyer Qualcomm assures that Arm decided to take advantage of the situation and get additional royalties, and the license terms were not intended to obtain such permission.
Finally, Arm categorically rejected Qualcomm's assertion that it plans to change its licensing model - the British company said that this information is misinformation and misleading, according to The Register.
In reality, the company is not going to limit partners' access to its technology and will continue to cooperate both with processor manufacturers and OEMs.

Arm will prohibit the proximity of its CPU and third-party modules in one chip, as well as impose royalties on manufacturers of end devices

The lawsuit between Arm and Qualcomm turned unexpectedly.The British developer of processors decided to radically change its business model: first, license fees will have to be paid by manufacturers of end devices, including smartphones and tablets; second, third-party components, including GPUs, NPUs and ISPs, will be prohibited in chips with Arm processors.

In late August Arm filed a lawsuit against Qualcomm.Qualcomm absorbed server processor developer NUVIA and, according to Arm, had to update its license agreement because it deemed all previous agreements with the company invalid after it bought it.Qualcomm filed a countersuit against the British developer, and new documentation on the case contains crucial details.Qualcomm's updated lawsuit says that after 2024, Arm will stop licensing its processor architecture to semiconductor component manufacturers - payments will be charged to end-device manufacturers.

Arm, according to the U.S.company, has already told OEMs that soon the only way for them to get Arm-based chips will be through direct license fees, and they'll have to accept these rules of the game.But that's not all.The British company has also decided to tighten its policy with respect to chip developers like Qualcomm: they will not be able to use third-party components in single-chip platforms with Arm processors if Arm offers their analogs as a licensed product.

This will affect graphics and network processors, as well as image processors.In other words, Arm will prohibit the creation of duos like Samsung and AMD chips, as well as MediaTek and Imagination - both pairs of companies cooperate in the field of mobile graphics.And Qualcomm itself does not use GPUs from Arm, but its own.Such an initiative Arm shows signs of anti-competitive behavior and it is possible that these steps will accelerate the companies' efforts to develop chips based on open architecture RISC-V.However, some of the British company's partners may not be affected by the new rules.

For example, NVIDIA has a 20-year license for the development of components with Arm-architecture.Apple was at the origins of Arm, so it is unlikely that these two can be destroyed so easily.There is also a version that a mutually beneficial cooperation binds Arm with Broadcom.Thus, the dispute between Arm and Qualcomm in just over two years threatens to affect the interests of many smaller players.

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According to Qualcomm, Arm is retaliating against the company for criticizing the deal with NVIDIA by demanding compensation for the use of Nuvia licenses

Early last year, Qualcomm bought the assets of processor developer Nuvia for $1.4 billion, which used the Arm architecture and held the relevant licenses.
According to Arm itself, this deal does not give Qualcomm the right to dispose of all the licenses inherited from Nuvia.
A dispute broke out between the companies, which they are trying to resolve in court.
Qualcomm believes that Arm is taking revenge for its criticism of the deal with NVIDIA.Image source: Qualcomm Recall that in the spring of this year NVIDIA was forced to abandon its intentions to buy Arm, because it opposed certain regulators, British officials and a variety of companies from among its customers.
Qualcomm was among them, and this summer it faced a lawsuit from the British developer, which accused it of misusing licenses for processor cores inherited from Nuvia.
The latter had a license for the architecture of Arm v8, which was available to Qualcomm, but Arm did not like the logic of interaction, and she demanded that the client stop using the development of Nuvia in their products.
According to Arm, after buying Nuvia, Qualcomm should have signed a new license agreement with the first of the companies.Qualcomm does not think it is right and necessary, calling Arm's claims revenge for its own position on the deal with NVIDIA, which collapsed in the spring.
Arm not only demanded extra payment for Qualcomm's right to use Nuvia's designs, but also tried to obstruct the work of that client's specialists on processors that use Nuvia's intellectual property.
Qualcomm representatives also added that Arm's original agreement with Nuvia did not provide for such control measures on the part of the British holding.
Arm believes that after Nuvia lost its independence, all the previous agreements lost their force and the new business owners represented by Qualcomm should conclude new contracts.In general, Qualcomm should pay Arm more for ready-made solutions, and in the case of using its own developments based on the Arm architecture, the royalties are reduced.
Apparently, in the precedent with Nuvia, the British developer simply does not want Qualcomm to pay him less.
The victory of Arm in this court dispute, according to Qualcomm, could untie its hands in the abuse of its own powers in relations with licensees.

Arm sues Qualcomm and Nuvia over breach of license agreements

Arm has sued Qualcomm and Nuvia.
They are accused of violating license agreements signed with Arm, as well as the trademark rights of the British chip developer.Image source: QualcommThe Qualcomm company has dominated the mobile chipset market for years.
However, things are not going well in the PC segment.
To boost its potential in the PC market, Qualcomm last year acquired startup Nuvia, which was developing computer Arm processors that, in theory, could compete with Apple's solutions in the mobile and desktop segments.UK Arm works with two types of customers: companies that use its development as the basis for their own chips, and companies that license only Arm instruction sets for their own processors.
Qualcomm and Nuvia have had agreements with Arm in both areas for years.
However, the licenses are not transferable from company to company and differ in detail.Therefore, according to Arm, Qualcomm with the acquisition of Nuvia \"tried to hijack Nuvia's licenses without Arm's consent.\" From this, the British developer concluded that the licensing agreements signed between it, Qualcomm and Nuvia individually were thus violated.
In this regard, in March 2022 Arm revoked licenses from Nuvia to use its technology.
However, the latter continued to develop chips with a set of its software instructions.As a result, Arm went to court to prohibit the development of certain Nuvia chips, which can still use its technology.
In addition, the company is seeking compensation for infringement of its trademark rights.
Arm's lawsuit could set back Qualcomm and Nuvia's efforts to develop chips for laptops, desktops and servers for many months.
It could also result in hefty fines for both companies.