TPL Moves for Partial Judgment of Non-Infringement to Remove ARM as a Defendant, and Expedite Appeal from the Court's US Patent '584 "Instruction Groups" Claim CUPERTINO, Calif. - Aug. 8, 2007 - In a further move to simplify and streamline the Moore Microprocessor Patent™ (MMP) Portfolio infringement trial in the US District Court in the Eastern District of Texas, The TPL Group today announced that it will ask the Court to enter a partial judgment of non-infringement as to certain products. Accordingly, the proposed partial judgment will:
- Stipulate that "instruction groups" claim elements of the accused claim of US Patent 5,784,584 (US '584) be deemed non-infringed for the purpose of this trial, based on the Court's claim interpretation, thereby allowing appeal from this claim interpretation ruling to be initiated immediately, rather than waiting until the end of trial.
- Stipulate that all accused ARM core families (ARM7, ARM9,ARM9E, ARM10E, ARM11), as well as the ARM Cortex microprocessor core family, are non-infringed under the Court's claim interpretation of "instruction groups," thereby removing ARM as an intervener in the Texas Court trial.
Other moves initiated by The TPL Group to streamline the trial include:
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Using selected semiconductor devices to represent groups or families of chips and/or end user products so that the infringement evidence completed on one semiconductor device can be applied to many devices and/or end user products.
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Filing (and being granted on August 7, 2007) a motion for continuance of the trial to January 2008, thereby allowing 60 more days for additional discovery time needed for the extremely broad scope and pervasiveness of infringing end user products, thereby paving the way for very clear and succinct presentations to the jury during the upcoming trial.
As a result of these moves by TPL, the trial will focus on two US patents in the MMP Portfolio (5,809,336 and 6,598,148), both of which encompass several claims against accused products manufactured by the defendants.
"We expect our streamlining efforts to be very helpful to all involved, especially the Court and Jury in reaching their decision at the five-day trial," said Dan Leckrone, Chairman of The TPL Group. "We are confident we will prevail." He confirmed that TPL is pursuing damages for past infringement, penalties for willfulness, and an injunction prohibiting further operations in the US.
Markman Ruling Perspective
The June 18th Markman ruling broadly confirmed the strength of MMP claims including the very significant affirmation of US 5,809,336 as applied to both modern PLL-based and non PLL-based systems. Following the ruling, Leckrone asserted, "The ruling reflects well the skill of the Texas Court in dissecting and dealing with a very complex trial over the past 15 months." At that time he noted that there was a specific phrase that would require further scrutiny, and that phrase, disclosed today, is "instruction groups" as it relates to "multiple instruction fetch" techniques protected by US '584.
Accelerating US '584 Appeal Process
Commenting on the proposed partial judgment relative to US '584, Leckrone said, "We continue to believe that the claim construction for 'instruction groups' deserves more scrutiny than the Court could give it during the Markman hearing due to time and space constraints. While the proposed partial judgment we are seeking agrees to a judgment of non-infringement on this claim construction for the Texas Court trial, it will allow us to seek reversal of this interpretation in the US Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit immediately. Otherwise, TPL would have had to wait for the end of the Texas Court trial in order to have the interpretation reviewed by the Court of Appeals."
Despite the Texas Court trial, the sweeping scope of applications using MMP design techniques continues to encourage manufacturers of end user products from around the globe to become MMP licensees. Since January 2006, HP, Casio, Fujitsu, Sony, Nikon, Seiko Epson, Pentax, Olympus, Kenwood, Agilent, Lexmark, Schneider Electric, NEC Corporation, Funai Electric, SanDisk, Sharp Corporation, Nokia and Bull have all purchased MMP Portfolio licenses.
About the MMP Portfolio
The Moore Microprocessor Patent Portfolio contains intellectual property that is jointly owned by the privately-held TPL Group and publicly-held Patriot Scientific Corporation (OTCBB: PTSC). The portfolio includes seven U.S. patents as well as their European and Japanese counterparts. It is becoming widely recognized that the jointly- owned patents protect fundamental technology used in designing microprocessors, microcontrollers, digital signal processors (DSPs), embedded processors and system-on-chip (SoC) devices. The MMP Portfolio is exclusively managed by Alliacense, a TPL Group Enterprise.
About The TPL Group
Founded in 1988, Technology Properties Limited (The TPL Group) has emerged as a global coalition of high technology enterprises involved in the development, management and commercialization of Intellectual Property (IP) assets as well as the design, manufacture and sales of proprietary products based on these same IP assets. Among the advanced products that The TPL Group enterprises continue to bring to market are system-on-chip solutions for distributed digital media processing applications. For more information, visit www.tplgroup.net.
