The EC has accepted commitments proposed by Rambus in settlement of the anti-trust actions brought by the EC against Rambus.
In return for the EC making no finding of liability, and not fining Rambus, Rambus has committed to offer licenses with maximum royalty rates for certain memory types and memory controllers on a forward-going basis.
Rambus offers licenses with maximum royalty rates for five-year worldwide licenses of 1.5% for DDR2, DDR3, GDDR3 and GDDR4 SDRAM memory types. Qualified Licensees will enjoy a royalty holiday for SDR and DDR DRAM devices, subject to compliance with the terms of the license.
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In addition, Rambus offers licenses with maximum royalty rates for five-year worldwide licenses of 1.5% per unit for SDR memory controllers through April 2010, dropping to 1.0% thereafter, and royalty rates of 2.65% per unit for DDR, DDR2, DDR3, GDDR3 and GDDR4 memory controllers through April 2010, then dropping to 2.0%.
Rambus will offer these licensing rates for the next five years. The royalty rates are applicable to future shipments only, and do not resolve any existing claims in other cases.
"Following a long and detailed examination of the facts, the Commission did not find that Rambus violated the law, nor did it impose any fine," said Thomas Lavelle, senior vice president and general counsel at Rambus. "For our part, we agree to offer licenses at attractive rates for customers to use our patented innovations in computing and electronics products for consumers worldwide."
The European Commission originally brought charges for infringements of competition law against Rambus in August 2007