Rambus Inc. investors have been dancing a little jig since late Monday on news of an important legal ruling in favor of
red the litigious memory chip designer in its recent patent suit against Nvidia Corp.
They were also heartened by comments by Rambus (RMBS 19.65, +0.30, +1.55%) executives on a conference call early Tuesday, including its general counsel Tom Lavelle and Sharon Holt, the company licensing czar. Holt, Rambus's senior vice president of licensing, said she believed "existing and potential licensees will take note" of Monday's International Trade Commission ruling in favor of Rambus. The ITC also ordered a halt to the sale or importation of Nvidia's (NVDA 9.19, +0.06, +0.66%) infringing chips.
But as usual, with Rambus, one battle does not necessarily win the war, and it is still engaged in its own corporate equivalent of Vietnam or Afghanistan, a seemingly endless legal war with the big guns in the memory chip industry. Investors in this company must either be well-versed in patent law, or maybe are just die-hard gamblers.
"Our clients are all institutional based," said Jeff Schreiner, an analyst with Capstone Investments who has a buy rating on Rambus with an optimistic price target of $40. "A lot of them make decisions whether or not to trade based on legal decisions. It's an evolving story and I think that has to be the statement for the investor base."
Detractors call Rambus just short of a patent troll, others call it a litigation machine, and its fans say it is an innovator. The company says it is continually adding innovations beyond the core memory patents of its computer scientist founders -- including designs that speed up the communications between memory chips and processors that it has used as its legal arsenal. The ITC win, which
red affirmed three Rambus patents, validated some of its newer designs, Lavelle told investors.
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