Rambus under fire from the Commission

After Intel last month, it’s now its former partner Rambus’ turn to be under fire from Nellie Croes, European Commissioner for Competition, even if the two affairs aren’t related.

The European Commission confirms having sent a Statement of Objections (SO) on July 30 to the champion of RDRAM for abuse of dominant position involving « patent ambush » on DRAM, a standard adopted by the JEDEC. Even Brussels admits that this is the first time they’ve dealt with case of this nature. The procedure will add to a previous decision by the American Federal Trade Commission a year ago that this same firm engaged in illegal monopolization.

You may recall that Rambus claims royalties from all manufacturers of SDRAM memory and takes legal action against those who refuse to pay. However, according to the Commission’s press release, Rambus simply mislead the JEDEC, of which it has been a member since 1995, by not revealing the existence of certain patents. In addition, without this "patent ambush", the Californian firm would not have been able to demand such high royalties. Rambus now has nine weeks to respond to authorities in the Old World and after this they can request an oral hearing. If its preliminary conclusions are confirmed, the Commission plans on having the firm stop this practice and can impose a fine. The SO already mentions more reasonable royalties as an adequate solution.