Rambus Inc. (RMBS), which develops and licenses chip interface technologies and architectures used in digital electronics products, said Thursday that the U.S. International Trade Commission has agreed to its request and instituted a probe regarding alleged infringement of nine of the company's patents by graphics chip maker NVIDIA Corp. (NVDA) and others whose products incorporate the disputed NVIDIA products.
The products in dispute include NVIDIA products that incorporate DDR, DDR2, DDR3, LPDDR, GDDR, GDDR2, and GDDR3 memory controllers, including graphics processors, and media and communications processors, Los Altos, California-based Rambus said.
A hearing date is yet to be set, the company noted.
Being a technology licensing company, Rambus is embroiled in several litigations on intellectual property rights. Last week, the company received a positive pre-trial ruling in California in its patent case against some of the world's largest semiconductor companies, including Hynix Semiconductor Inc., Samsung Electronics Co. Ltd., Nanya Technology Corp. and Micron Technology Inc.
There are also several other cases pending, including a battle with the Federal Trade Commission that may be headed to the Supreme Court. The FTC has asked the high court to review a U.S. Court of Appeals decision to overturn the FTC's own ruling that Rambus was guilty of monopolistic behavior.
Rambus shares closed Thursday's regular trading session at $10.61, down 69 cents or 6.11% but gained 37 cents or 3.49% in after hours trading.
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