AMD to Pay $12.1 Million over FX Bulldozer False Marketing Claims

[Tsing]

AMD has raised the white flag on its Bulldozer processor lawsuit with a $12.1 million payout, which equates to $35 a chip. The company was sued back in 2015 for marketing FX CPUs (e.g., FX-9590) as having eight separate cores, but enthusiasts saw things a little differently.

Bulldozer chips comprise four modules, each of which contain a pair of CPU cores. These aren't fully fledged, independent cores that can run separate processes, so consumers argued that they should have been advertised as having four cores, not eight.

…a California judge rejected AMD’s claim that "a significant majority" of people understood the term "core" the same way it did. What people buying chips imagine a core to be would be a significant part of such a lawsuit, the judge noted, and instructed that the case to move forward.

 

[Grimlakin]

That's interesting. I think with all of the positive press they have been getting AMD simply chose to eat the settlement cost here and move forward rather than saber rattle and subject the market to some negative press about AMD.

 

[Brian_B]

PR probably a consideration. I think it's just as likely the cost-benefit ... trying to get a judge and jury to understand a "core" could easily eat up a lot of $800/hr legal time, and they were already in it for who knows how many $$$$ in legal fees just to this point alone.

Even if they won, it's just a matter of time until the next sleezy patent troll comes knocking around.

 

[Zarathustra]

Can't wait to get my 27 cents!