LOS ALTOS, Calif. (AP) -- Chip maker Rambus Inc. said Tuesday it has agreed to a $379 million settlement with Hynix Semiconductor Inc. in a patent dispute that has dragged on nearly a decade.
Rambus will receive $349 million in back royalties on disputed chip technology, plus $48 million in interest.
Rambus shares rose $1.11, or 14 percent, to $9 in premarket trading.
The settlement proposal has been filed with the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California, which last week upheld a 2008 jury decision finding Hynix products had used technology rightfully protected by Rambus patents.
Hynix, based in South Korea, argued that Rambus sought to acquire the rights to industry-standard components for DRAM, or dynamic random access memory, chips while serving on the council that set those standards in the 1990s. As a member of the Joint Electron Device Engineering Council, or JEDEC, Rambus was required to disclose any patent applications or its intention to seek them, Hynix said.
In his ruling last Tuesday, however, Judge Ronald Whyte shot down that argument, writing in his decision that "there was no clearly understood agreement of JEDEC members to disclose patent applications or the intent to seek patents relevant to standards being discussed."