( ESNUG 556 Item 2 ) -------------------------------------------- [02/01/16]
Subject: SCOOP II - SNPS loses 2 patents in its lawsuit against AtopTech
A QUICKIE RECAP OF THE SYNOPSYS VS. ATOPTECH LAWSUIT:
06/2011 -- Extreme-DA licensed its Parmetric OCV signoff technology
used in their GoldTime STA tool to Atoptech -- to use in
Atoptech's P&R and timing engine.
06/2011 -- Aart's lawyers sue Extreme-DA over GoldTime STA violating
patent 6,237,127 (ignoring false paths and using exceptions
in STA) amoungst other claims.
10/2011 -- Aart acquires Extreme-DA.
05/2013 -- DeepChip leaks rumor that Aart is about to sue Atoptech
in ESNUG 528 #1.
07/2013 -- SNPS sues Atoptech on 12 counts including the Extreme DA
POCV plus 4 patents plus copyright violation of 100+
PrimeTime "input formats" (commands) in ESNUG 528 #3.
10/2013 -- Judge Samuel Conti of U.S. District Court dismisses
11 out of 12 SNPS claims against Atoptech, including
the 4 patent violations, because "the court finds
Plaintiff's allegations do not provide enough detail
to be plausible" in ESNUG 528 #7.
Judge Conti lets the PrimeTime copyright case continue
plus gives SNPS "leave to amend" the other 11 claims.
12/2015 -- After lots of legal gyrations, Synopsys vs. Atoptech
boils down to four Synopsys patents ('348, '941, '127,
and '967) plus the PrimeTime 100+ commands copyright.
SCOOP II -- Roughly 2 weeks ago on 01/19/2016, the U.S Patent Office issued
a 29 page final decision from an inter partes review that Synopsys patent
6,237,127 (ignoring false paths and using exceptions in STA) was "obvious"
from prior art and therefore "unpatentable".
In addition, on that same day the same 3 judges in the same Patent Office
also issued a 35 page final decision that Synopsys patent 6,567,967 (PnR
SW can partition a big design into smaller blocks to work on it) was also
"obvious" from prior art and therefore "unpatentable".
Got that?
Out of 12 allegations Aart's lawyers made against Atoptech back in 2013, in
the 31 months since then all that's left now are:
- Synopsys patent 6,405,348 (software can use crosstalk aggressor
net analysis while doing STA timing) -- is it obvious?
- Synopsys patent 6,507,941 (using detailed subgrid routing to find
wire locations at the grid level) -- is it obvious?
- Are the 100+ or so PrimeTime commands copyright protected or not?
So after all this dumbshit lawyer Sturm und Drang, it looks like Atoptech
is finally getting some well deserved breakthroughs in court. EDA shouldn't
be about suing; it should be about writing better chip design SW.
- John Cooley
DeepChip.com Holliston, MA
---- ---- ---- ---- ---- ---- ----
Related Articles
Aart's sue rivals policy backfires horribly on core SNPS patents
Join
Index
Next->Item
|
|
