Seagate Sues Solid State Drive Manufacturer

jmke · 15th April 2008, 14:11

Seagate Technologies, the world’s largest manufacturer of hard disk drives, on Monday filed a lawsuit against STEC Inc. (formerly Simple Tech), a company that designs and manufacturers flash-based as well as dynamic random access memory-based products. Seagate claims that STEC infringes the hard drive maker’s patents and demands that STEC would stop selling solid state drive and pay unspecified damages to Seagate.

http://www.xbitlabs.com/news/storage... facturer.html

15th April 2008, 16:50

Can't handle the competition anymore just sue and say there infringing on your patents!

Kougar · 15th April 2008, 20:13

Yeah. Guess this means I'll be buying Hitachi's instead of Seagates from now on. Of course, I think Seagate seriously underestimated what they just got themselve's into. I hope STEC counter-sues and invalidates Seagate's patents.

Quote:

STEC released a statement regarding the Seagate lawsuit. Here's a portion from that statement:

STEC is one of the first companies to build SSDs, having designed, manufactured and shipped SSDs as early as 1994, long before any of the suggested patents were issued to Seagate. Given the effect SSDs are having on the HDD market, STEC believes that Seagate's lawsuit is completely without merit and primarily motivated by competitive concerns rather than a desire to protect its intellectual property. STEC believes that Seagate's action is a desperate move to disrupt how aggressively customers are embracing STEC's Zeus-IOPS technology and changing the balance of power in enterprise storage. Seagate is sending a clear signal that it recognizes STEC as the leader in the SSD business and is attempting to slow down part of the growth that STEC is gaining through its SSD offering, particularly in the enterprise segment. STEC will aggressively pursue its defense to this infringement action.

In addition, STEC will also closely examine the patents asserted by Seagate as STEC believes it held such technology including prior patents, dating more than a decade prior to any of Seagate's patents. Although STEC is in the process of analyzing the claims in this lawsuit, STEC believes that Seagate's asserted patents pertain to technologies where STEC has years of prior experience and/or patents. STEC has significant patents related to SSD which have been developed through the decades of experience STEC has with developing, manufacturing and shipping SSDs. Beyond that long history, STEC also believes that many of Seagate's claims are not relevant to SSD. For example, STEC was one of the originators of stacking technology with patents dating back to the mid-1990s, while Seagate's patent on this matter was issued in 2005.

Through this process, STEC will determine if Seagate is misappropriating any of STEC's core technologies; STEC will take appropriate action to protect its interests, including seeking the invalidation of Seagate's patents.

jmke · 15th April 2008, 21:06

legal mumbo jumbo slows everything down :/

15th April 2008, 14:11	#1
jmke Madshrimp Join Date: May 2002 Location: 7090/Belgium Posts: 82,497	Seagate Sues Solid State Drive Manufacturer Seagate Technologies, the world’s largest manufacturer of hard disk drives, on Monday filed a lawsuit against STEC Inc. (formerly Simple Tech), a company that designs and manufacturers flash-based as well as dynamic random access memory-based products. Seagate claims that STEC infringes the hard drive maker’s patents and demands that STEC would stop selling solid state drive and pay unspecified damages to Seagate. http://www.xbitlabs.com/news/storage... facturer.html __________________

15th April 2008, 21:06	#4
jmke Madshrimp Join Date: May 2002 Location: 7090/Belgium Posts: 82,497	legal mumbo jumbo slows everything down :/ __________________

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15th April 2008, 16:50	#2
Kayden Posts: n/a	Can't handle the competition anymore just sue and say there infringing on your patents!