August 30, 2001 – New York, NY – Philips Corp., an affiliate of Royal Philips Electronics, and Linear Technology Corp. have agreed to settle their patent dispute relating to US Patent No. 4,689,740 (the ‘740 Patent).

As part of the settlement, the parties will file a joint motion to dismiss all claims between the companies. In addition, the parties have entered into a non-exclusive licensing agreement under which Linear Technology is a licensee of Philips’ I2C/SMBus patent rights. The rest of the terms were not disclosed.

The patent relates to I2C/SMBus technology, which uses a two-wire bus system for controlling communications between ICs. Linear Technology is the second company to reach a settlement agreement with Philips Electronics regarding the ‘740 Patent. Cirrus Logic Inc. settled on April 11, 2001.

Philips filed a lawsuit alleging infringement of the ‘740 patent in the US District Court in New York on Oct. 2, 2000 against six companies: Analog Devices Inc., Norwood, MA; Cirrus Logic Inc., Austin, TX; Cypress Semiconductor Corp., San Jose, CA; Fairchild Semiconductor Corp., South Portland, ME; Linear Technology Corp., Milpitas, CA, and Standard Microsystems Corp., Hauppauge, NY.

The action will continue to proceed against the four remaining companies.