Sidense files to nix rival's patents

LONDON – Sidense, a licensor of one-time-programmable fuse-based memory intellectual property, has petitioned the United States Patent and Trademark Office to invalidate one-transistor memory patents that rival Kilopass has attempted to assert against it.

Sidense Corp. (Ottawa, Canada) has asked the USPTO to re-examine U.S. Patent Nos. 6,777,757 and 6,856,540, assigned to Kilopass Technology Inc. (Santa Clara, Calif.) and each entitled “High Density Semiconductor Memory Cell and Memory Array using a Single Transistor,” and rule that the claims of these patents are invalid.

"These re-examination actions are part of Sidense's ongoing program to vigorously protect and defend our patented, industry-leading 1T-Fuse architecture," said Xerxes Wania, Sidense president and CEO, in a statement.

"Several months ago, Kilopass filed an action making vague and unfounded assertions that OTP memory arrays based on the Sidense architecture infringe these patents," said Wania. "While Kilopass has been so far unable or unwilling to explain how these arrays could possibly infringe, we have learned that, in granting these patents, the USPTO did not apply key prior art. Upon reexamination, we believe the USPTO will find these patents invalid over that prior art."

The prior art referenced by Sidense includes patents filed by Mohsen et al. and assigned to Actel.

"Because of telltale similarities between the Kilopass technology and the Actel patent, and taking into account that inventor Jack Zezhong Peng appears to have worked at Actel before filing the Kilopass application, we believe these patents are principally based upon Actel technology and that the USPTO will rule them invalid," said Wlodek Kurjanowicz, Sidense chief technical officer.


Related links and articles:

www.sidense.com

www.kilopass.com

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