Nvidia sues Qualcomm & Samsung over Graphics Patents

The chipmaker organization Nvidia Corp NVDA.O has taken legal actions against its rivals Qualcomm QCOM.O & Samsung Electronics 005930.KS with the accusation both the companies of infringing Nvidia’s patented graphics processing technology. This incident has happened right after the happening of launching Galaxy Note Edge and Galaxy Note 4 by Samsung. In their 2 year history of existence, for the first time Nvidia has claimed and sued against any company for unauthorized uses of their graphics technology. They have filed the complaints with both the US District Court in Delaware and the US International Trade Commission.

Nvidia states that it has been in business with Qualcomm for providing chips regarding graphics for their smartphones and tablets. But Qualcomm along with Samsung have been accused of using Nvidia’s patented technologies in their gadgets, including the just-revealed Galaxy Note Edge and Galaxy Note 4 without their concern. Jen-Hsun Huang, the Chief Executive of Nvidia claimed on a conference hall, “They’re using our technology for free in their devices today and they’re shipping an enormous number of devices.” He also wants all the Samsung and Qualcomm products that are using their technologies without their permission to stop being sold. Nvidia were in a talk with Samsung; but after making no progress out of that talk, Nvidia was forced to take legal lawful actions against the Qualcomm & the South Korean giant. They have asked to block at least 12 of Samsung’s devices with Qualcomm’s Adreno, Imagination’s PowerVR graphics chips or ARM’s Mail.

The green team had attempted to reach a licensing agreement with both these companies about the patents for the last two years. But due to the failed efforts by Nvidia, it has claimed to be compensated with money by the two companies that Nvidia has sued against. Samsung has said that it would fight against Nvidia about the claim while Qualcomm are yet to make any kind of statement or announcement. Samsung said, “Following a thorough review of the complaint, we will take all measures necessary against Nvidia’s claims.”

Samsung has been known to use processors of Qualcomm in their high end devices and gadgets. For instance, Snapdragon 805 chip has been used in Note 4 while also using of Exynos chips in some models; which are sold in South Korea. Samsung is not a stranger when it comes to patent suits; as we all know; they have been accused by the Apple for using their technologies for the past several years. Though they have reached an agreement outside the US soil, their lawsuit is still going on in the country.
On the other hand, Nvidia is taking no rest, as it has claimed that at least seven of their patented technologies had been infringed, including-

• The GPU, Nvidia’s foundation invention.
• Programmable shading, invented by Nvidia.
• Nvidia’s unified shaders.
• Multithreaded parallel processing in GPU, also the invention of Nvidia.

So there is and will be an argument about who is responsible for these actions and it will be interesting to see those big companies fighting against each other.