CMU wins $1.17 billion verdict against Marvell over HDD patents


Recommended Posts

By Matthew DeCarlo

On December 27, 2012, 2:00 PM EST

Nine jurors have ordered Marvell to pay Carnegie Mellon University $1,169,140,271 in damages for infringing two hard drive patents. If the ruling sticks on appeal, it would claim more than a year's worth of profits at Marvell, which earned just over $900 million last year and $615 million this year. Additionally, it would be the largest US patent verdict to date, topping this August's $1.05 billion ruling in the Apple versus Samsung case.

Held at a Pittsburgh federal court, the four-week trial involved CMU patents (No. 6,201,839 and 6,438,180) describing "noise predictive technology" that increases the speed by which circuits in hard drives read data from magnetic disks. Marvell insisted that the university hasn't made any innovations, as a Seagate patent (No. 6,282,251) filed 14 months prior to one of CMU's holdings describes everything covered by the patents in question.

The jury disagreed with that argument, finding Marvell guilty of selling 2.34 billion chips with the technology without a license from CMU. Even worse, the jury found that Marvell's infringement was willful, which could allow trial judge Nora Barry Fischer to award triple the damages -- a figure that would approach the Bermuda-based semiconductor company's $3.77 billion market cap. The final judgment is set to be made on May 1, 2013.

Marvell will appeal the ruling and maintains that it strongly believes "the theoretical methods described in these patents cannot practically be built in silicon even using the most advanced techniques available today, let alone with the technology available a decade ago." The company added that it uses its own patented read channel technology developed in-house. Following the news, Marvell's share price has fallen by more than 10%.

http://www.techspot.com/news/51184-cmu-wins-117-billion-verdict-against-marvell-over-hdd-patents.html

Patents will be this countries downfall.

Patents should exist, HOWEVER, the length of time you can hold a patent should be changed.. it should be much shorter to allow for tech advances and prevent patent hoarding

Patents will be this countries downfall.

They probably do need to be reformed. I'm not very educated in what was gong on in this case so I can't really make an opinion on it. If Marvell used technology that they knew they needed a license for then that is a problem. I'm not pro-destroying whatever legit protection IP and inventor owners have. Some reform needs to happen so that at least these patent dispute conflicts get handled in a more organized way. Right now the court room dramas that play out and I'm sure the lawyer bills are the most ridiculous component to the whole thing.

If I came up with some IP and patented it, any of the major players could probably rip it off from me leaving me with little recourse as there is no way I could afford the legal fight they would put up over it.

Patents should exist, HOWEVER, the length of time you can hold a patent should be changed.. it should be much shorter to allow for tech advances and prevent patent hoarding

By granting someone a patent on something, a third party's private property rights are unwillingly forfeited. Patents, along with intellectual property, place restrictions on how someone can configure their private property in a private exchange. Essentially, it uses the idea of a configuration/concept/idea to illegitimately lay claim to the private property of others.

I fail to see how such things belong in a free society.

How did they infringe a patent that can't even be implemented with today's technology? Also, they had their own patent and the jury "disagreed with that argument". It seems to me like the jury was pressured to side against a non-US company.

How did they infringe a patent that can't even be implemented with today's technology? Also, they had their own patent and the jury "disagreed with that argument". It seems to me like the jury was pressured to side against a non-US company.

Welcome to contemporary US Justice?

This topic is now closed to further replies.
  • Recently Browsing   0 members

    • No registered users viewing this page.
  • Posts

    • Ocenaudio 3.19.5 by Razvan Serea  Ocenaudio is a full featured, fast and easy to use audio and music editor. It is the ideal software for people who need to edit and analyze audio files without complications. Ocenaudio also has powerful features that will please more advanced users. To assist ocenaudio development, a powerful toolset of audio editing, analysis and manipulation called Ocen Framework was created. ocenaudio is also based on Qt framework, a well known library for cross-platform development. Cross-platform support ocenaudio is available for all major operating systems: Microsoft Windows, Mac OS X and Linux. Native applications are generated for each platform from a common source, in order to achieve excelent performance and seamless integration with the operating system. All versions of ocenaudio have a uniform set of features and the same graphical interface, so the skills you learn in one platform can be used in the others. VST plugins support Ocenaudio supports VST (Virtual Studio Technology) plugins, giving its users access to numerous effects. Like the native effects, VST effects can use real-time preview to aide configuration. Real-time preview of effects Applying effects such as EQ, gain and filtering is an important part of audio editing. However, it is very tricky to get the desired result by adjusting the controls configuration alone: you must listen the processed audio. To ease the configuration of audio effects, ocenaudio has a real time preview feature: you hear the processed signal while adjusting the controls. The effect configuration window also includes a miniature view of the selected audio signal. You can navigate on this miniature view in the same way as you do on the main interface, selecting parts that interest you and listening to the effect result in real time. Multiselection for delicate editions To speed up complex audio files editing, ocenaudio includes multi-selection. With this amazing tool, you can simultaneously select different portions of an audio file and listen, edit or even apply an effect to them. For example, if you want to normalize only the excerpts of an interview where the interviewee is talking, just select them and apply the effect. Eficient edition of large files With ocenaudio, there is no limit to the length or the quantity of the audio files you can edit. Using an advanced memory management system, the application keeps your files open without wasting any of your computer's memory. Even in files several hours long, common editing operations such as copy, cut or paste happen almost instantly. Fully featured spectrogram Besides offering an incredible waveform view of your audio files, ocenaudio has a powerful and complete spectrogram view. In this view, you can analyze the spectral content of your audio signal with maximum clarity. Advanced users will be surprised to find that the spectrogram settings are applied in real time. The display is updated immediately when altering features such as the number of frequency bands, window type and size and dynamic range of the display. Ocenaudio 3.19.5 changelog: Fixes crashes related to audio devices on Windows (DirectSound and ASIO) Fixes several crashes and memory corruption issues Fixes opening several headerless files at once, which previously dropped all but one Improves batch export by suggesting and remembering the destination folder Fixes accented and non-Latin characters in VST plug-in and compressed-archive file names Adds zstd compression support and updates the archive library Other bug fixes and improvements Download: Ocenaudio 64-bit | Portable | ~40.0 MB (Freeware) Download: Ocenaudio for Linux and Mac OS View: Ocenaudio Homepage | Screenshot Get alerted to all of our Software updates on Twitter at @NeowinSoftware
    • I did think about a Echo show once and it would be useful to see what my cameras see. But my brother got one and I changed my mind. Adverts and not really worth the price just to see my cameras. I have a load of dots and a Echo Gen 4, they will do.
    • I asking where you are from or live, because if you don't live in the U.K, why are you so bothered? That is another reason I voted out, E.U and people poking their noses in where they should not be. Sadly we still have it, Trump, and his cronies. Putin as well and no doubt others. It makes no difference what we believe, if we made the right choice or not, we are out. As I said to someone when the news first broke we have voted out, we just need to make the best of it. I have no problems with closer ties to the E.U, we still need to trade. Just don't want to be in their club.
    • So you think I voted out because i am anti-immigrant. I am fed up with those that come over and think that we owe them something. The ones that are at the moment coming over from France where they are already in a safe country because they think and no doubt will get everything chucked at them. While people who were born and bred here get very little. I have nothing against as i have said before those that come here and work. In fact I know full well that our NHS would struggle without them. I do have a problem with those that come over here and try to push their religion and their way of life onto us. My reasons for voting out was because of what the E.U is and is also becoming. I did not agree with Freedom of movement, not because I don't want people over here, but because people need to be checked before being allowed to cross borders and that goes both ways. But my main thing was because the E.U is becoming if not already a united states of Europe. The only reason countries like Poland and Romania joined was because they had no money. When my partner left Poland, she had nothing, Poland had nothing, that is why she left. Wanted to learn something and earn a living. The E.U would have us back according to Michel Barnier. https://www.euronews.com/my-eu...ator-barnier-tells-euronews Why are you so scared to say what country you are in?
    • I wonder what that line really meant...
  • Recent Achievements

    • One Month Later
      Excellence2025 earned a badge
      One Month Later
    • Week One Done
      Excellence2025 earned a badge
      Week One Done
    • Week One Done
      flexorcist earned a badge
      Week One Done
    • One Month Later
      Woland13 earned a badge
      One Month Later
    • Week One Done
      Woland13 earned a badge
      Week One Done
  • Popular Contributors

    1. 1
      +primortal
      500
    2. 2
      +Edouard
      205
    3. 3
      PsYcHoKiLLa
      145
    4. 4
      Steven P.
      72
    5. 5
      FloatingFatMan
      68
  • Tell a friend

    Love Neowin? Tell a friend!