Apple infringes two patents of S3 Graphics Co. Ltd, ITC Judge E. James Gildea has ruled after concluding that the Cupertino-based Mac maker giant, unlike other tech giants, was using S3 Graphics compression technology without a license. The parent company of S3 Graphics Inc., based in Fremont, Calif., and other subsidiaries operating in Shanghai, China and Taipei, Taiwan,
S3 Graphics Co. Ltd. was “pleased to win this portion of the ITC investigation," said CEO Dr. Ken Weng.
International Trade Commission (ITC) Judge E. James Gildea found that Apple infringes US patents no. 6,658,146 (directed to systems and methods for compressing images) and no. 6,683,978 (directed to image data formats).
Both these patents belong to S3 Graphics. The technology described in them is referred to as S3 Texture Compression (S3TC) in the industry.
"S3 Graphics has a long history of designing graphics processor chips and technology," said Dr.Weng.
"S3 Texture Compression has been implemented in over 1 billion computers, game consoles and mobile devices worldwide. S3 Texture Compression is invaluable for advanced 3-D video graphics."
According to the company whose patents Apple is infringing upon, S3 Texture Compression is widely licensed and implemented.
S3 Graphics claims that Microsoft has licensed and implemented the S3 Graphics technology in DirectX products since 1998. It’s also used in its Windows 7 operating system.
And while Microsoft could be the biggest licensee, Sony, Nintendo and others have also licensed and used the technology in their respective products (in this case, video games).
S3 Graphics filed its ITC complaint in May 2010. An eight-day trial was held in March 2011, according to the official report.
Judge Gildea’s confidential detailed analysis and rulings should be received by the attorneys handling the case early next week.
Unless modified by a majority vote of the ITC Commissioners, his decision will become final decision on Nov. 1, 2011.
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