Congrats to Magma and Synopsys With this blog, I'm sending a quick congratulations to Synopsys and Magma Design Automation for setting a long-running patent infringement lawsuit. It's good news for the EDA industry, and for Magma users in particular.	Richard Goering EDA Software Editor
Synopsys and Magma announced late Thursday that they have reached an out-of-court settlement in a bitter patent infringement lawsuit that's been ongoing since 2004. The dispute ended with the cross-licensing of eight patents and a $12.5 million payment by Magma to Synopsys. This lawsuit was so confusing and convoluted that I won't even attempt a history here. When you realize that Magma and Synopsys each cross-licensed four disputed patents to each other, you can see how complex it got. There's a fairly detailed history in today's EE Times web story. It's a big relief for Magma, which was paying around $12 million per year in legal expenses and was, originally, under threat of an injunction from Synopsys. The legal expenses were cutting into the bottom line for Magma, whose total annual revenues are now around $180 million. Moreover, the company's stock price was depressed, making it difficult to do acquisitions. Some observers felt that Synopsys was trying to turn back a competitive threat from Magma by running the company into the ground legally. But the dispute started when Magma sent a letter to Synopsys warning of possible patent violations. The resolution frees both Synopsys and Magma to make more investments in technology, so it's good news for all users of IC design tools. And Magma users no longer have to worry that Synopsys might someday put Magma out of business, or cause it to withdraw a product. Finally, the resolution helps restore the EDA industry's image, which has been tarnished by litigation. The precognition award of the day goes to John Cooley, who came pretty close to predicting the outcome in a recent "poker player's" assessment of the case. Cooley today speculated that "something really ugly must have been happening on the Synopsys side of this case for Synopsys to have agreed to any settlement." I don't know about "really ugly," but the most recent court decision was widely viewed as a victory for Magma. Maybe Synopsys saw the tide was running the wrong way. For those interested, here's a timeline for the case, provided by Magma. Note that there were two separate cases in California and Delaware. And here's a list of cross-licensed patents, provided by Synopsys. Both companies might get some new technology out of the deal. '114 — Method for the Physical Placement of an Integrated Circuit Adaptive to Netlist Changes '438 — Timing Closure Methodology '446 — Timing Closure Methodology '508 — Method for Logic Optimization for Improving Timing and Congestion During Placement in Integrated Circuit Design '093 — Facilitating Press Operation in Abutted-Pin Hierarchical Physical Design '116 — Optimization of Abutted-Pin Hierarchical Physical Design '328 — Method for Storing Multiple Levels of Design Data in a Common Database '745 — System and Method for Estimating Capacitance of Wires Based on Congestion Information Again, my congratulations to Magma and Synopsys for resolving the EDA industry's most notable legal dispute. Posted by Richard Goering on Mar 30, 2007 09:07 PM in EDA Software

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