DEC, Intel to meet in court but may settle engineer issue

Electronic News, July 14, 1997 by Gale Bradley

A settlement over Dr. Sager may come after the two companies "meet and confer" soon, it was said, but the wrangling over the length of Intel's contractual obligations to supply Digital does not appear to be headed in that direction. The back-and-forth over supply between the two is a symptom of the patent infringement allegations traded, not the cause.

From the words of Intel's Peter Detkin, director of litigation for the corporation, it seems the two sides are the least likely to meet and confer, much less settle, on their supplier agreements any time soon. Mr. Detkin said Digital "continues to say they've got a long-term supply agreement, and we don't believe that's so." In Digital's first statements to the press in May, Digital said the agreement was in place and extended over years, therefore keeping its sizable Intel CPU system business safe (EN, May 19). Intel has asked and would very much like to see a copy of the contract, Mr. Detkin said.

Intel is certain that its contractual obligation for microprocessors and chipsets ends after this year's third quarter and "that's it," Mr. Detkin said. The Basic Order Agreement (BOA) Digital speaks of "only covers flash memory and microcontrollers," he said.

Digital general counsel Thomas Siekman was not available late last week, and a Digital spokesman said, "We're not giving out the Basic (Order) Agreement." Teams led by Digital chairman Robert B. Palmer and Intel president Craig C. Barrett are reportedly negotiating to settle much of the suits and perhaps even negotiating to bring Digital aboard Intel's next-generation microprocessor plans. Mr. Detkin and the Digital spokesman would not comment in any way on that.

On July 3, Intel responded in the Worcester, Mass., federal court where Digital filed its opening shot on May 13. Digital characterized Intel's response as "like Bart Simpson would respond, just 'I didn't do it', 'We didn't do it." Mr. Detkin concurred to some degree, saying the July 3 legal response was "a non-event."

Wednesday, Digital must respond in Silicon Valley for its turn. "I don't know what to expect," Mr. Detkin said. "They could file a boilerplate, two-page filing, generally denying everything, or they could file a 200-page missive accusing us of every nefarious act since and including the Kennedy assassination." At the time of the countersuit, Intel said it came as a matter of "the vigorous defense we promised" and for the purposes of stopping further exchange of confidential Pentium and Pentium II information that went out to Digital.

About the engineer both companies have employed, Dr. Sager, Digital had made certain requests to the same Worcester court toward the end of June. Digital asked that it be allowed to interview him without Intel's presence and "only about work he had done while under Digital's employ," the Digital spokesman said. He also wanted to make clear that the company made no allegations that Dr. Sager violated non-disclosure agreements he may have signed.

To this, Mr. Detkin said, "What they are asking, they are not entitled to." Still, don't expect much more filings on the subject, because "this is the type of thing the parties usually can work out and we are on our way to doing that. We're going in to what's called the 'meet and confer' process about that...It should stay out of the courts now," he said.