SanDisk, Ritek Settle Suit
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Flash memory vendors reach a settlement in their patent dispute and sign a cross-licensing deal.
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Cost: $288m Toshiba has settled its rancorous NAND flash memory lawsuit with Lexar, but at a hefty price.â¦
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The Business Software Alliance scores a record settlement in a copyright infringement case.
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In lieu of facing a court judgment of possibly more than US$1 billion, Sun Microsystems has agreed to pay $92 million to settle a long-running patent infringement case with Eastman Kodak.
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Eastman Kodak Co. and Sun Microsystems Inc. have settled their lawsuit over whether Sun infringed on Kodak&#39;s patents in creating the Java platform.
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Sony and Ampex have agreed to end their dispute over a patent covering thumbnail images in digital image storage and retrieval devices.
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(InfoWorld) - One of the last of the popular P-to-P (peer-to-peer) music sharing sites has been defeated, with eDonkeyâs agreement to settle its copyright infringement case with the record industry. In documents filed with the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York on Monday, eDonkey founders and parent company MetaMachine Inc. said theyâll pay US$30 million to record companies to settle the case. They also agreed to refrain from conducting any further business that might involve copying, distributing or otherwise infringing copyrighted works. The settlement follows just more than a month after Sharman Networks Ltd., developer of the file-sharing software Kazaa, said it would pay the entertainment industry $100 million to settle similar lawsuits. Other file-sharing companies to succumb include Grokster Ltd., which shut down last year after losing a case in front of the U.S. Supreme Court. The eDonkey Web site now features a statement, similar to one on the Grokster site, informing visitors that illegal downloaders can be prosecuted and ominously warning visitors that they arenât anonymous by displaying and claiming to log their IP address. The eDonkey settlement will be paid to Arista Records LLC, Atlantic Recording Corp., Capitol Records Inc., Elektra Entertainment Group Inc., Sony BMG Music Entertainment and UMG Recordings Inc. Lime Wire LLC is one of few the remaining popular file-sharing software companies although in August a group of record companies filed a suit against it in the U.S. asking for damages that could amount to as much as $476 million. Late last year, eDonkeyâs founder predicted the demise of the file-sharing industry. During a speech in front of the U.S. Senate Judiciary Committee, he warned that U.S. P-to-P companies would all cease to exist because they would lack the resources to defend themselves against the record companies under the ruling he characterized as vague in the Grokster suit. The record companies and movie studios have spent the last couple years carrying out attacks against the creators of file-sharing software, contending they should be held liable for copyright infringement by their users. The file-sharing software developers have largely failed in their arguments that they warn users not to illegally transfer materials and so shouldn't be held responsible for how people use their products. REFERENCES: Kazaa settles with record industry, Jul. 27, 2006Grokster shuttered in court settlement, Nov. 7, 2005US P-to-P companies will disappear, executive says, Sep. 30, 2005
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Company agrees to settle charges over copy-protection software it included in music CDs.
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Samsung and a US subsidiary have agreed to pay $90 million to settle charges that it colluded to keep the price of DRAM memory artificially high.
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By John Stebbins  CHICAGO:- Shares of SanDisk, the world's largest maker of flash- memory cards, dropped sharply Wednesday after the company said price declines would accelerate.
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(InfoWorld) - Toshiba and Micron TechnologyÂ have settled a number of outstanding lawsuits regarding alleged patent infringement and theft of trade secrets related to computer memory chips. Under terms of an agreement announced Friday, Toshiba will purchase some Micron patents related to semiconductor technology and license patents previously owned by Lexar Media, which wasÂ acquired by MicronÂ earlier this year. Toshiba will pay $288 million to Micron in return for the patents and licenses, Toshiba said. The amount is substantially less than the $465 million inÂ compensation awarded to LexarÂ by a California court in 2005. The payment has been on hold since late last year after Toshiba succeeded in having the damages reconsidered andÂ filed an appealÂ seeking to overturn the original guilty verdict. Earlier this year Lexar raised the stakes by asking the U.S. International Trade Commission toÂ bar the importÂ of some of Toshiba's NAND flash-memory chips and products containing them. The ITC action will now be dismissed, along with others at the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California and the California Court of Appeals, Toshiba said. Toshiba became business partners with Lexar when it invested $3 million in the company in 1997 and acquired a seat on its board of directors. According to Lexar's original complaint, Toshiba sat on the board for two and a half years and gained access to the company's product plans and technology, while at the same time working with Lexar rival SanDisk. Â
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Ampex and Sony have settled a patent dispute over digital-camera technology, Ampex said Monday. As part of the deal, Redwood City, Calif.
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(InfoWorld) - Sony BMG Music Entertainment will pay $1.5 million in penalties to settle lawsuits with two U.S. states over its controversial use of copy protection software. The settlements with the California and Texas attorneys general were announced Tuesday, seven months after theÂ music giant settled a class-action lawsuit in the matter. Sony's trouble began in late 2005, when a computer science researcher disclosed that Sony's had beenÂ shipping CDs with a copy protection program that used dangerous "rootkit" techniquesÂ to cloak itself after installation. Sony licensed this software from First 4 Internet Ltd., based in Banbury, U.K., but problems were also found with a second copy protection program used by Sony. That software, called Media Max, was developed by SunnComm International Inc. of Phoenix. Until Tuesday, Texas had been the only state with an outstanding lawsuit related to the rootkit fiasco, but other state's attorneys general and the U.S. Federal Trade Commission had also been looking into the matter, according to Jeff McGrath, deputy district attorney, with Los Angeles County, which participated in the California lawsuit. Sony has now reached tentative settlements with more than a dozen other states, including Massachusetts and Nebraska, as well as the FTC, McGrath said. The FTC declined to comment on the matter. The California lawsuit was both filed and settled on Tuesday. Sony's rootkit software shipped on an estimated 15 million CDs, bundled with music from artists such as Frank Sinatra, Celine Dion and Earl Scruggs. Consumers were offered refunds as part of the May class-action agreement, but Tuesday's settlements take additional steps by compensating them for damages caused by the rootkit code and "ensuring that this type of thing will not happen again," McGrath said. California and Texas consumers who believe that their computers were damaged by Sony's software can receive up to $175 to cover repair costs. The agreements also force Sony to submit any software it ships with music CDs to third-party audits for the next five years. Sony has created a Web site to address its rootkit settlement. That site is eventually expected to include instructions for consumers seeking refunds for their PC repairs. These refunds will, for example, compensate users who had their CD drives trashed when AOL's antispyware software tried to remove the First 4 files, said Paco Felici, a spokesman with the Texas Attorney General's office. Since the rootkit fiasco, Sony has stopped shipping digital rights management software with its music CDs. However, if it does add this capability to future CDs, it must make this clear to customers. "They're requiring disclosures to consumers before sale on the CD packaging," said Corynne McSherry, a staff attorney with the Electronic Frontier Foundation. "I think that's really crucial. Part of the whole background of the rootkit fiasco was that consumers just didn't know what they were getting into." A Sony spokesman declined to comment on investigations by the FTC and other states. "We are pleased to have reached agreements with the offices of the California and Texas Attorneys General," he said, reading from a statement.
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Two companies, a door manufacturer and a dental laboratory network, have agreed to pay tens of thousands of dollars to settle Business Software Alliance (BSA) claims that they had unlicensed software on their computers.TruStile Doors, a manufacturer of residential and commercial doors based in Denver, has agreed to pay $92,500 to settle BSA claims that it had unlicensed copies of Microsoft and Symantec software on its computers, the BSA said Monday.The company has developed a software license management program, according to a BSA news release.Sentage, a national network of dental laboratories and provider of other dental services, based in Minneapolis, has agreed to pay $80,000 to settle claims that it had unlicensed copies of Microsoft and Symantec software on its computers.Both companies also agreed to delete all unlicensed copies of software installed on their computers, acquire any necessary replacement licenses, and implement stronger software license management practices, the BSA said.BSA wants the settlements to &quot;remind businesses of all industries about the high price of infringement and the importance of software compliance,&quot; Jenny Blank, BSA&#39;s senior director of legal affairs, said in a statement.BSA offers rewards of up to $1 million for qualifying reports of unlicensed software, although actual awards are often much less.
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SanDisk Corp. on Tuesday introduced new high-end capacities of 4GB, 1GB and 2GB for its Memory Stick Pro, Memory Stick Pro Duo and SD storage cards, respectively, as well as an increase to 512MB for its miniSD and RS-MMC media for cell phones.
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By Mark Johnson Associated Press  ALBANY, N.Y. -- Samsung Electronics Co., the world's largest memory chip maker, agreed to pay $90 million to settle a lawsuit charging the company and others with price-fixing, New York Attorney General Andrew Cuomo said Tuesday.
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Sony BMG has settled with the Federal Trade Commission, agreeing to reimburse consumers up to $150 for damage to the computers caused by the label's use of rootkits to prevent piracy of its discs.