Sidense wins patent infringement case against Kilopass

Update: Synopsys Expands DesignWare IP Portfolio with Acquisition of Sidense Corporation (Oct. 17, 2017)

The Court finds that there is no genuine dispute of material fact that Sidense’s technology does not infringe

Ottawa, Canada – August 17, 2012 – Sidense Corp., a leading developer of Logic Non-Volatile Memory (LNVM) OTP IP cores, announced today that the United States District Court for the Northern District of California granted Sidense’s motion for summary judgment of non-infringement of all three Kilopass patents asserted in the lawsuit. The Court determined that no reasonable jury could find that Sidense infringed any claim of Kilopass’ asserted patents. This is a resounding victory for Sidense and Kilopass will not be permitted to present its patent infringement claims to a jury.

The Court provided three separate reasons that Sidense’s technology does not infringe any of Kilopass’ asserted patents. First, the Court found that Sidense does not have a “row wordline segment coupled to the second doped semiconductor region.” The Court found that Kilopass had taken contradictory positions before the Court and the United States Patent Office and, as a result, had disavowed this claim scope. Second, the Court determined that Sidense’s accused technology did not have the required “first doped semiconductor region,” rejecting Kilopass’ argument that a shallow trench isolation in Sidense’s design was equivalent to the claimed “doped semiconductor region.” Finally, the Court determined that Sidense’s design did not have a first and second doped semiconductor region in a “spaced apart relationship” as required by the claims. While any one of these reasons would have been sufficient for Sidense to prevail, the Court’s opinion finding three separate reasons that Sidense does not infringe bodes well for Sidense should Kilopass decide to appeal the Court’s decision.

 “We are extremely pleased with the judge's ruling, which validates our long-standing belief that the Kilopass patent claims against Sidense are without merit,” said Xerxes Wania, Sidense President and Chief Executive Officer.  “We've spent a considerable amount of time and money to prove that we're right in this litigation.  We refused to be held hostage by this frivolous lawsuit, and now we've been vindicated.”

About Sidense Corp.

Sidense Corp. provides secure, very dense and reliable non-volatile, one-time programmable (OTP) memory IP for use in standard-logic CMOS processes with no additional masks or process steps required. The Company’s innovative one-transistor 1T-Fuse™

architecture provides the industry’s smallest footprint, most reliable and lowest power Logic Non-Volatile Memory (LNVM) IP solution. With 94 patents granted or pending, Sidense OTP provides a field-programmable alternative solution to Flash, mask ROM and eFuse in many OTP and MTP applications.

Sidense SiPROM, SLP and ULP memory products, embedded in more than 230 customer designs, are available from 180nm down to 28nm and are scalable to 20nm and below. The IP is offered at and has been adopted by all top-tier semiconductor foundries and selected IDMs. Customers are using Sidense OTP for analog trimming, code storage, encryption keys such as HDCP, WHDI, RFID and Chip ID, medical, automotive, and configurable processors and logic. For more information, please visit www.sidense.com