Cypress, LSI Logic, and VLSI Technology Win Reversal of TI Classic Package Lawsuit.

SAN JOSE, Calif.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Aug. 28, 1995--Today, Judge Barefoot Sanders of the Northern District of Texas Federal Court set aside a jury verdict in favor of TI and against Cypress Semiconductor (NYSE:CY), LSI Logic, and VLSI Technology.

Judge Sanders ruled that, as a matter of law, TI had failed to prove that the defendants infringed TI patents covering processes for the plastic encapsulation of semiconductor parts. Judge Sanders granted the defendant's motion which urged that the undisputed evidence showed the patent claims, as construed by Judge Sanders himself, were not infringed by the defendants packaging processes.

Cypress's CEO T.J. Rodgers said, "Judge Sanders' ruling is consistent with what we have been saying since TI first sued us five years ago. Their so-called `plastic package' patent filed in 1963, relates to the the encapsulation of a single transistor in a 3-wire package. The patent does not now and never has covered modern integrated circuit packaging. That point became embarrassingly evident in the courtroom when TI expert witness Joseph McAlexander jammed the probes of an ohm meter into the ends of a Cypress plastic package in a futile attempt to `prove' that the parts of a modern leadframe buried in the plastic were actually `leads,' in the conventional sense of `conductors which protrude from the package for external connections.' Mr. McAlexander's giant stretch of engineering credibility was part of TI's attempt to prove that the '027 patent covered modern assembly technologies. Later, on cross examination, Cypress Attorney Paul Heller touched McAlexander's ohm meter to his nose and got the same result as the Cypress product. `Am I a conductor?' he wryly asked Mr. McAlexander to laughter in the courtroom."

Rodgers continued, "The TI '027 patent was rejected by the Patent Office on multiple occasions as being `obvious.' After fighting for fourteen years with the Patent Office, the '027 patent finally issued. Since that time, '027 has been in almost continuous litigation, because TI continues to demand unreasonable royalties for a patent that never should have been issued."

Rodgers continued, "When the jury verdict was first announced earlier this year, Cypress wrote-off its share of the verdict, $17 million, in the March quarter. We will continue to hold that money in reserve until the TI appeal has failed."

Cypress, LSI Logic, and VLSI Technology were defended by a legal team headed by Randy Bain of Brown and Bain.

Cypress Semiconductor Corporation designs, develops and manufactures a broad range of high-performance integrated circuits, including programmable logic devices (PLDs), field programmable gate arrays (FPGAs), static RAM and EPROM memories, data communications products, programmable clock oscillators, high-speed logic, PC chipsets and multichip modules. Cypress shares are traded on the New York Exchange under the symbol CY. Corporate headquarters are located in San Jose, California.

CONTACT: Cypress Semiconductor Corporation

Manny Hernandez, 408/943-2754