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February 12, 2008 |
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DIRECTV GROUP: Buys Patent Portfolio License From TPL Group The DIRECTV Group Inc. has purchased a Moore Microprocessor Patent(TM) (MMP) Portfolio license from The TPL Group. DIRECTV distributes digital entertainment programming via satellite to residential and commercial subscribers. "We welcome DIRECTV to the rapidly growing list of MMP licensees," said Carl Silverman, Vice President, Licensing for Alliacense. "The recently announced settlement with all remaining defendants in TPL's MMP patent infringement case in Texas together with a favorable Markman ruling have really ignited our licensing activity." The sweeping scope of applications using MMP Portfolio design techniques continues to encourage the world's leading manufacturers of end user products from around the globe to become MMP Portfolio licensees. Since January 2006 over 30 global companies from the US, Europe, Japan, Korea and Taiwan have purchased MMP Portfolio licenses. The MMP Portfolio patents, filed by The TPL Group in the 1980s, cover techniques that enable higher performance and lower cost designs, and are fundamental to consumer and commercial digital systems ranging from DVD players, cell phones and portable music players to communications infrastructure, medical equipment -- and automobiles which today have dozens of microprocessor-based key features and benefits. About MMP Portfolio The Moore Microprocessor Patent Portfolio contains intellectual property that is jointly owned by the privately-held TPL Group and publicly-held Patriot Scientific Corporation (OTCBB: PTSC). The MMP Portfolio includes seven U.S. patents as well as their European and Japanese counterparts. It is widely recognized that the MMP Portfolio protects fundamental technology used in microprocessors, microcontrollers, digital signal processors (DSPs), embedded processors and system-on-chip (SoC) devices. About DIRECTV Group Headquartered in El Segundo, California, The DIRECTV Group Inc. (NYSE:DTV) -- http://www.directv.com/ -- provides digital television entertainment in the United States and Latin America. It has two segments, DIRECTV U.S. and DIRECTV Latin America. The DIRECTV U.S. segment provides direct-to-home digital television services in the multichannel video programming distribution industry in the United States. The DIRECTV Latin America segment provides digital direct-to-home digital television services to approximately 1.6 million subscribers in 27 countries, including Brazil, Argentina, Venezuela, and Puerto Rico. * * * In April 2007, Standard & Poor's Ratings Services affirmed the 'BB' corporate credit and 'BB-' senior unsecured debt rating on The DIRECTV Group Inc. S&P said the outlook is stable. In addition, Standard & Poor's raised the bank loan rating on US$2 billion of credit facilities at DIRECTV Holdings LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of The DIRECTV Group Inc, to 'BB+' from 'BB' and revised the recovery rating to '1' from '3'. |
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