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Comment by Deinos | Hacker News Reader

The article mentions Cyrix as a "victim" of Intel patent defense; however, Cyrix not only won their lawsuits, but they also went after Intel for patent violations in the Pentium Pro and Pentium II processors.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cyrix

http://law.justia.com/cases/federal/district-courts/FSupp/84...

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You can win a lawsuit and still lose so much time and money on the way that you are worse off afterwards.

Vice versa you can cause your opponents so much trouble with lawsuits that - even though you don't win them - you are better off than them afterwards.

But Microsoft is bigger than Intel. So if anything, they will cause trouble to Intel.

It's not just about direct litigation costs. If they could e.g. block a major product release, the damage becomes much greater.

Both can afford to spend hundreds of millions on a lawsuit. The lawsuit will be only a part of the budget for both and non-existential. So I don't think that the size matters here.

It would be different if the lawsuit is so expensive that one party could go bankrupt due to it.

This isn't about right and wrong. It's about money. Who has to pay how much to the other party? Both parties think they are better off if they fight. Both parties think they could win money in the end. It's a gamble in the courtroom.

The stakes could potentially present an existential risk to Intel. Imagine if Microsoft won and transitioned all Windows customers to ARM. That would be a huge blow to Intel's market!

Very true. Often a larger actor with even larger pockets can turn a winnable battle into a losing war of attrition.

In this case, it appears that Cyrix came out on the other side of the battle in a better position for their win. It would seem it was their later acquisition by National Semiconductor that eventually snuffed them out.

Basically what happened between Intel and AMD.

Creative vs Aureal Semiconductor is a good example. Creative sued them multiple times while at the same time stealing their patented technology! Creative lost every single lawsuit, but legal costs forced Aureal into bankruptcy. Creative bought assets on the cheap.

"If we are victorious in one more battle with the Romans, we shall be utterly ruined", as someone once remarked.

Like Ireland almost bankrupted by repeatedly winning the Eurovision Song Contest and having to host it the following year.

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