Dennis, you are exactly on target. Rambus has the advantage of IP
protection. Since it will be incorporated by Intel into its design, the
sort of commodification that occurred with RAM probably will not repeat
itself. I suspect that the fear of Rambus explains the hesitancy to
produce more RAM capacity -- making a shortage probable over the next year
or more.
>
> On Fri, 16 Jun 2000, Michael Perelman wrote:
>
> > DRAM is not protected by IP. It is regarded as a commodity, like wheat or
> > soybeans. A processor chip is protected.
>
> This may be changing, though -- new and more complex types of DRAM, like
> Rambus' RDRAM, are indeed protected by IP agreements. Toshiba just
> paid through the nose to license design tech from Rambus, and
> Rambus is also suing Hitachi over IP violations.
>
> All of which has thoroughly pissed off the biggest DRAM producers around,
> namely the Taiwanese foundry firms, who are pushing commodity-based SDRAM
> instead. So maybe there's a kind of, well, dialectic between IP and non-IP
> here.
>
> -- Dennis
>
>
--
Michael Perelman
Economics Department
California State University
Chico, CA 95929
Tel. 530-898-5321
E-Mail [EMAIL PROTECTED]
