According to the Financial Times , the sales ban affects not only Intel CPUs but also HP and Dell computers that use them. California-based R2 Semiconductor is trying to prove in court in various jurisdictions that Intel is illegally using some of its patents related to voltage regulators built into CPUs.
R2 Semiconductor's win in Germany affects both HP and Dell
In December 2023, a German court recognized the validity of R2 Semiconductor’s claims to copyright in one of the disputed technologies. In the US, the company lost a legal dispute with Intel, and a British court has yet to rule.
The German court ruling affects Intel's Ice Lake, Tiger Lake, and Alder Lake processors, as well as the Ice Lake-SP generation Xeon server processors. Sources close to Intel explain that the damages from this ruling are reduced because some of the processors listed have been discontinued, while the latest Raptor Lake and Raptor Lake Refresh CPUs are not affected by this patent dispute.
In an official statement, Intel said that R2 Semiconductor was engaging in “a series of extortion attempts against companies that are genuine innovators.” Intel sought to invalidate R2 Semiconductor’s patents through the courts in the United States, and then turned its attention to European courts. Overall, Intel sees its opponent in this dispute as a trivial “dummy” and a “patent troll”—a company that does not conduct any real activity other than litigation.
The German court ordered Intel to provide statistics on processor sales affected by the dispute in Germany since March 2020, as the amount of material damage will be determined based on this information. Unsurprisingly, Intel is challenging the court's decision.
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