Patent office again finds in favor of MMP portfolio

LONDON — The US Patent Office has again affirmed the validity of US’336, the most widely recognized patent in the Moore Microprocessor Patent (MMP) portfolio jointly owned by Patriot Scientific Corporation and the TPL Group (Cupertino, Calif.)

The ruling follows multiple validity attacks on the MMP Portfolio by several electronics industry giants from around the world.

The MMP portfolio includes U.S. patents, as well as their European and Japanese counterparts, which Patriot and TPL consider fundamental to the design of modern microprocessors, microcontrollers and system-on-chip devices. Licensees include: Fujitsu, Philips, SanDisk, Nokia, NEC, Sony, Hewlett Packard, Psion, Audiovox and Lego.

They are named after Charles H. Moore, chief technology officer of TPL Group, who is credited with inventing the Forth software programming language and is known for his work in the 1980s on stack-based microprocessors.

The TPL group said recent "victories" significantly strengthen the MMP Portfolio patents – and also "magnify the risk for those companies without a license to the technology."

In the latest ruling, the USPTO "resoundingly rejected" re-examinations filed by NEC, Toshiba, and the Public Patent Foundation and rejected another attempted attack by HTC. This followed a similar verdict two months ago regarding a Reexamination Certificate for the US’584 "Multiple Instruction Fetch" patent over the reexaminations filed by NEC and Toshiba.

In January of this year the German Patent Court confirmed the validity of another patent in the portolio, EP’730 , rejecting a "nullity action" brought by Deutsche Telecom.

"This remarkable story demonstrates that the re-exam delay tactic routinely encouraged by lawyers defies business sense, since it usually backfires by strengthening the very patents under attack," said Mac Leckrone, president of Alliacense, the TPL Group Enterprise subsidiary handling the MMP patent portfolio.

"Combined with favorable "Markman" rulings in the Eastern District of Texas in 2007, and the steady addition of over 60 licensees since the launch of the Licensing Program in 2005, the MMP Portfolio continues its phenomenal ascendance as one of the most important patent portfolios in the history of electronics,” noted the company.

After a series of rulings in 2007, core families belonging to microprocessor technology licensor ARM Holdings plc (Cambridge, England) were deemed non-infringing and granted exclusion from the MMP infringement trial in the U.S. District Court in the Eastern District of Texas.

Mike Davis, Senior Vice President of Licensing at Alliacense, added :"These developments obviously diminish any uncertainties associated with purchasing the required MMP Portfolio license, and will thus have a direct impact on the market price going forward

http://eetimes.eu/germany/220000704