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GlobalFoundries Sues TSMC for Patent Infringement, Seeking Import Ban

posted by martyb on Tuesday August 27 2019, @01:00AM   Printer-friendly
from the GF-found-something-sue-table dept.

takyon writes:

GlobalFoundries Files Patent Claims Against TSMC, Seeks to Ban Imports of Nvidia, Apple Chips

GlobalFoundries (GF) today announced that it filed lawsuits against Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company (TSMC) in the U.S. and Germany over the alleged infringement of 16 patents. The company said that it's looking to halt the import of processors made with the technologies and is seeking "significant damages from TSMC based on TSMC's unlawful use of GF's proprietary technology in its tens of billions of dollars of sales." Impacted companies include Nvidia and Apple.

Note that GlobalFoundries said it wants to stop the import of processors made with the technologies it believes are covered by its patents. The company recognized that TSMC doesn't usually import those processors into the U.S. or Germany; TSMC's customers do. That means the lawsuits could affect much of the tech industry: TSMC said that in 2018 it was "manufacturing 10,436 different products using 261 distinct technologies for 481 different customers."

The list of companies supplied by TSMC includes AMD, Nvidia, Apple, Mediatek and many others, which means that GlobalFoundries could bring the tech industry to a halt if it's allowed to stop imports to the U.S. and Germany.

If you can't beat 'em, sue 'em.

Also at Wccftech.

Related: GlobalFoundries Abandons "7nm LP" Node, TSMC and Samsung to Pick Up the Slack
GlobalFoundries Spins Off ASIC Solutions Division, Creating a New Subsidiary: Avera Semiconductor

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  • (Score: 5, Informative) by takyon on Tuesday August 27 2019, @02:26AM (1 child)

    by takyon (881) <takyonNO@SPAMsoylentnews.org> on Tuesday August 27 2019, @02:26AM (#885899) Journal

    AMD, Nvidia, Apple, and Mediatek are companies supplied by TSMC. TSMC is being targeted by GlobalFoundries. Even if AMD chips aren't part of any import ban being sought, AMD's main supplier could be hurt by this lawsuit. It could affect TSMC's competitiveness and AMD's choices going forward (they were supposed to ditch GloFo once they shrink the I/O die). Worst case scenario for TSMC, AMD switches to Samsung.

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  • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday August 27 2019, @04:59AM

    by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday August 27 2019, @04:59AM (#885952)

    Sure, blocking the sale, or at least increasing the cost of, nvidia gpus is likely to really hurt AMD.