Source: s3://data.kl3m.ai/documents/govinfo/USCOURTS/USCOURTS-cand-5_06-cv-00244/USCOURTS-cand-5_06-cv-00244-56/pdf.json

Nature of Suit Code: 830
Nature of Suit: Patent
Cause of Action: 35:271 Patent Infringement

---

United States District Court

For the Northern District of California

1

2

3

4

5

6

7

8

9

10

11

12

13

14

15

16

17

18

19

20

21

22

23

24

25

26

27

28

ORDER REGARDING JOSEPH McALEXANDER

C-00-20905; C-05-00334; C-06-00244 RMW

TSF

E-filed: 2/19/08 

IN THE UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT

FOR THE NORTHERN DISTRICT OF CALIFORNIA

SAN JOSE DIVISION

HYNIX SEMICONDUCTOR INC., HYNIX

SEMICONDUCTOR AMERICA INC.,

HYNIX SEMICONDUCTOR U.K. LTD., and

HYNIX SEMICONDUCTOR

DEUTSCHLAND GmbH,

Plaintiffs,

v.

RAMBUS INC.,

Defendant.

No. CV-00-20905 RMW

ORDER REGARDING JOSEPH

McALEXANDER

[Re Docket No. 3215]

Case 5:06-cv-00244-RMW Document 900 Filed 02/19/08 Page 1 of 8
United States District Court

For the Northern District of California

1

2

3

4

5

6

7

8

9

10

11

12

13

14

15

16

17

18

19

20

21

22

23

24

25

26

27

28

ORDER REGARDING JOSEPH McALEXANDER

C-00-20905; C-05-00334; C-06-00244 RMW

TSF 2

 RAMBUS INC.,

Plaintiff,

v.

HYNIX SEMICONDUCTOR INC., HYNIX

SEMICONDUCTOR AMERICA INC.,

HYNIX SEMICONDUCTOR

MANUFACTURING AMERICA INC., 

SAMSUNG ELECTRONICS CO., LTD.,

SAMSUNG ELECTRONICS AMERICA,

INC., SAMSUNG SEMICONDUCTOR, INC.,

SAMSUNG AUSTIN SEMICONDUCTOR,

L.P., 

NANYA TECHNOLOGY CORPORATION,

NANYA TECHNOLOGY CORPORATION

U.S.A.,

Defendants.

No. C-05-00334 RMW

[Re Docket No. 1249]

RAMBUS INC.,

Plaintiff,

v.

MICRON TECHNOLOGY, INC., and

MICRON SEMICONDUCTOR PRODUCTS,

INC.

Defendants.

No. C-06-00244 RMW

[Re Docket No. 860]

This order addresses whether Joseph McAlexander may testify regarding two specific

exhibits. The court has reviewed the briefs filed and grants the motion in part. The Manufacturers

may not examine him in connection with the "admission" from the Infineon litigation, but may use,

based upon their representation, versions of JEDEC standard 21-C.

I. THE TWO-DAY RULE

 Rambus's trial brief first argues that the Manufacturers cannot call Joseph McAlexander on

Tuesday, February 19 because he was improperly disclosed. This matter has been resolved, but

merits comment to avoid future misunderstanding. The proceedings on Thursday, February 14,

Case 5:06-cv-00244-RMW Document 900 Filed 02/19/08 Page 2 of 8
United States District Court

For the Northern District of California

1

2

3

4

5

6

7

8

9

10

11

12

13

14

15

16

17

18

19

20

21

22

23

24

25

26

27

28

ORDER REGARDING JOSEPH McALEXANDER

C-00-20905; C-05-00334; C-06-00244 RMW

TSF 3

ended while Rambus was conducting its cross-examination of Lester Vincent. Following the

proceedings, the court inquired as to who would testify after Mr. Vincent on the next day of

testimony (Tuesday, February 19). The Manufacturers stated that:

Mr. Ruby: We'll have ready for Tuesday, as I understand it, Mr. Oh, Dr. Oh,

Graham Allan, Mr. Krashinsky, and we have the video if we run out

of time.

The court: Okay.

Mr. Ruby: Okay.

Tr. 1725:16-20. Apparently by email on Saturday afternoon (February 16), the Manufacturers

indicated that after Mr. Vincent's testimony finished, they would call Dr. Oh, play the video of Mr.

Yoo, and then call Joseph McAlexander.

The court's order explaining trial procedures stated that, "Exhibits to be used in connection

with the examination of a witness must be identified with the witness 2 business days prior to calling

the witness." E.g., Docket No. 1137, C-05-00334, at ¶ D (N.D. Cal. Jan. 30, 2008). The order's

intent is that a party must inform the other side two business days before they intend to call a

witness. If the Manufacturers wished to call Mr. McAlexander on Tuesday, they should have

identified him on Thursday, February 14, the date on which they expressly did not identify him.

The Manufacturers respond that Rambus's argument is "baseless" because "[t]he

Manufacturers identified Mr. McAlexander and disclosed the materials to be used in connection

with the examination of Mr. McAlexander six business days prior to February 18. Rambus has had

the materials for over ten calendar days." Opp'n at 1 (emphasis in original). Basically, the

Manufacturers interpret the rule as requiring disclosure at least two business days before they intend

to call a witness.

The Manufacturers misunderstand the text and purpose of the disclosure order. First, the rule

does not include the words "at least" – it states that witnesses must be disclosed two business days

before the party intends to call them. The purpose of the two-business day rule is to enable the other

side to prepare its cross-examination and any objections to exhibits or demonstratives in a

reasonable manner. While providing more time allows the other side more time to prepare, the

argument fails when extended to its conclusion. Under the Manufacturers' "at least two business

Case 5:06-cv-00244-RMW Document 900 Filed 02/19/08 Page 3 of 8
United States District Court

For the Northern District of California

1

2

3

4

5

6

7

8

9

10

11

12

13

14

15

16

17

18

19

20

21

22

23

24

25

26

27

28

ORDER REGARDING JOSEPH McALEXANDER

C-00-20905; C-05-00334; C-06-00244 RMW

TSF 4

days" rule, the Manufacturers could disclose all of their witnesses and accompanying exhibits, call

them in any order they desire, and leave Rambus scrambling to effectively cross-examine witnesses

as the order in which they are called keeps shifting.

Indeed, this appears to be happening and this problem is not limited to Mr. McAlexander. At

present, the Manufacturers appear to have disclosed over 11 hours of direct testimony. See Tr.

1726:18-1727:23 (argument of Mr. Stone). Under the version of the rule the Manufacturers now

advocate, they could put on any of those witnesses whenever they please because they have been

disclosed for more than two business days. This puts Rambus at a disadvantage and also prejudices

the court's ability to resolve trial motions in a reasonable manner. For example, trial motions

regarding the testimony of William Davidow, Terry Lee, and Graham Allan have all been briefed,

but no one knows when the Manufacturers will call these witnesses. The two-day rule described

herein must be followed by both sides in the future.

II. SPECIFIC EXHIBITS

Rambus also objects to the use of two types of exhibits with Mr. McAlexander: prior

statements in litigation and various copies of JEDEC standards.

A. The "Undisputed Facts" From The Infineon Litigation

The Manufacturers intend to ask Mr. McAlexander to opine whether a reasonable memory

engineer would have been on notice that Rambus was seeking patents covering aspects of the

JEDEC SDRAM standard. In forming that opinion, Mr. McAlexander relied on three statements

Rambus made to JEDEC: its disclosure of the '703 patent in 1993, its letter regarding patent issues

relating to SyncLink in 1995, and its resignation letter in 1996. The Manufacturers hope to bolster

the perceived reliability of Mr. McAlexander's opinion by demonstrating that he considered the

entire "universe" of statements Rambus made to JEDEC. Rambus argues that the evidence in this

trial has revealed other communications, notably an instance where Richard Crisp refused to

comment regarding patent rights.

Nonetheless, the Manufacturers hope to introduce as evidence a statement regarding

"undisputed facts" from the Infineon litigation. Infineon submitted that after Richard Crisp

Case 5:06-cv-00244-RMW Document 900 Filed 02/19/08 Page 4 of 8
United States District Court

For the Northern District of California

1

2

3

4

5

6

7

8

9

10

11

12

13

14

15

16

17

18

19

20

21

22

23

24

25

26

27

28

1 The court declines to decide whether the statement is an "admission" under FRE

801(d)(2) and therefore not hearsay. The Ninth Circuit has stated that "a statement made by an attorney

is generally admissible against the client." Totten v. Merkle, 137 F.3d 1172, 1176 (9th Cir. 1998)

(emphasis added). In Totten, the Ninth Circuit was considering the admissibility of an unsigned

declaration of the party submitted by the attorney. Id. On the other hand, the First Circuit has explained

that, "unlike, say, factual allegations in trial court pleadings, statements contained in briefs submitted

by a party's attorney in one case cannot routinely be used in another case as evidentiary admissions of

the party." Martel v. Stafford, 992 F.2d 1244, 1248 (1st Cir. 1993). Without deciding whether the

statement here involves an admission, FRE 403 concerns substantially outweigh the probative value..

ORDER REGARDING JOSEPH McALEXANDER

C-00-20905; C-05-00334; C-06-00244 RMW

TSF 5

disclosed the '703 patent, Rambus "made no other disclosures of patents or pending patents" while at

JEDEC. Rambus disputed the statement, explaining that: "The '703 patent disclosure, Rambus'

September 1995 letter, and its June 1996 letter were the only communications to JEDEC that

commented on Rambus' patents or patent applications."

The probative value of Rambus's statement is minimal. At best, it bolsters McAlexander's

selection of data on which he is rendering his opinion, though the jury has already heard about Mr.

Crisp's refusal to comment (and will no doubt here more). On the other hand, explaining the

statement requires explaining the Infineon litigation, which the court has already ordered kept out of

evidence absent good cause. Because admitting the exhibit into evidence in connection with Mr.

McAlexander's testimony is substantially more prejudicial than probative, the court excludes it

pursuant to Rule 403.1

 This issue may be revisited if Rambus emphasizes and faults Mr.

McAlexander because he failed to consider other evidence.

B. Various Copies of the JEDEC 21-C Standard

The Manufacturers also plan to elicit testimony from Mr. McAlexander regarding the

viability of alternative technologies. In doing so, they hope to use various releases of the JEDEC

21-C standards to illustrate what technological features are in the standard. Rambus objects, arguing

that Mr. McAlexander's report does not disclose the exhibits or shed light on how he intends to use

them. The court's understanding of the oral argument on this motion is that the standards will only

be used for illustrative purposes, and not to support testimony beyond the bounds of Mr.

McAlexander's expert report. Compare Tr. 1755:21-22 (Mr. Bobrow: "So it's a very, very limited

use that we intend to make.") with Tr. 1754:16-19 (Mr. Eskovitz: "You know, if it's simply a matter

of showing that the JEDEC standards, the JEDEC standard for SDRAM or DDR include a particular

Case 5:06-cv-00244-RMW Document 900 Filed 02/19/08 Page 5 of 8
United States District Court

For the Northern District of California

1

2

3

4

5

6

7

8

9

10

11

12

13

14

15

16

17

18

19

20

21

22

23

24

25

26

27

28

ORDER REGARDING JOSEPH McALEXANDER

C-00-20905; C-05-00334; C-06-00244 RMW

TSF 6

feature, I don't think that's a concern of ours[.]"). Provided the exhibits remain confined to their

limited uses, the court denies Rambus's motion to exclude them. In the event that Rambus feels that

the Manufacturers are using the exhibits in a way not supported by Mr. McAlexander's report, it may

renew the objection.

III. ORDER

For the foregoing reasons, the court grants the motion in part. The Manufacturers may not

examine Mr. McAlexander in connection with the "admission" from the Infineon litigation. Based

upon the representation of intended use, the Manufacturers may offer the various releases of JEDEC

21-C.

DATED: 2/19/08 

RONALD M. WHYTE

United States District Judge

Case 5:06-cv-00244-RMW Document 900 Filed 02/19/08 Page 6 of 8
United States District Court

For the Northern District of California

1

2

3

4

5

6

7

8

9

10

11

12

13

14

15

16

17

18

19

20

21

22

23

24

25

26

27

28

ORDER REGARDING JOSEPH McALEXANDER

C-00-20905; C-05-00334; C-06-00244 RMW

TSF 7

Notice of this document has been electronically sent to:

Counsel for Rambus Inc., all actions Counsel for Hynix entities, C-00-20905 and C-05-00334

Burton Alexander

Gross

Burton.Gross@mto.com Allen Ruby ruby@allenrubylaw.com

Carolyn Hoecker

Luedtke

carolyn.luedtke@mto.com Belinda Martinez Vega bvega@omm.com

Catherine Rajwani crajwani@sidley.com Daniel J. Furniss djfurniss@townsend.com

Craig N. Tolliver ctolliver@mckoolsmith.com Geoffrey Hurndall Yost gyost@thelenreid.com

David C. Yang david.yang@mto.com Jordan Trent Jones jtjones@townsend.com

Douglas A. Cawley dcawley@mckoolsmith.com Joseph A. Greco jagreco@townsend.com

Erin C. Dougherty erin.dougherty@mto.com Kenneth Lee Nissly kennissly@thelenreid.com

Gregory P. Stone gregory.stone@mto.com Kenneth Ryan O'Rourke korourke@omm.com

Jennifer Lynn Polse jen.polse@mto.com Patrick Lynch plynch@omm.com

Keith Rhoderic Dhu

Hamilton, II

keith.hamilton@mto.com Susan Gregory

VanKeulen 

svankeulen@thelenreid.com

Kelly Max Klaus kelly.klaus@mto.com Theodore G. Brown, III tgbrown@townsend.com

Miriam Kim Miriam.Kim@mto.com Tomomi Katherine

Harkey 

tharkey@thelen.com

Peter A. Detre detrepa@mto.com Counsel for Micron entities, C-06-00244

Pierre J. Hubert phubert@mckoolsmith.com Aaron Bennett Craig aaroncraig@quinnemanuel.com

Rosemarie Theresa

Ring

rose.ring@mto.com David J. Ruderman davidruderman@quinnemanuel.

com

Scott L Cole scole@mckoolsmith.com Harold Avrum Barza halbarza@quinnemanuel.com

Scott W. Hejny shejny@sidley.com Jared Bobrow jared.bobrow@weil.com

Sean Eskovitz sean.eskovitz@mto.com John D Beynon john.beynon@weil.com

Steven McCall

Perry 

steven.perry@mto.com Leeron Kalay leeron.kalay@weil.com

Thomas N Tarnay ttarnay@sidley.com Linda Jane Brewer lindabrewer@quinnemanuel.co

m

William Hans

Baumgartner, Jr

wbaumgartner@sidley.com Rachael Lynn Ballard

McCracken

rachaelmccracken@quinnemanu

el.com

Robert Jason Becher robertbecher@quinnemanuel.co

m

Yonaton M Rosenzweig yonirosenzweig@quinnemanuel.

com

Case 5:06-cv-00244-RMW Document 900 Filed 02/19/08 Page 7 of 8
United States District Court

For the Northern District of California

1

2

3

4

5

6

7

8

9

10

11

12

13

14

15

16

17

18

19

20

21

22

23

24

25

26

27

28

ORDER REGARDING JOSEPH McALEXANDER

C-00-20905; C-05-00334; C-06-00244 RMW

TSF 8

Counsel for Nanya entities, C-05-00334 Counsel for Samsung entities, C-05-00334 and C-05-

02298

Chester Wren-Ming Day cday@orrick.com Ana Elena Kadala anita.kadala@weil.com

Craig R. Kaufman ckaufman@orrick.co

m

Claire Elise Goldstein claire.goldstein@weil.com

Glenn Michael Levy glevy@orrick.com David J. Healey david.healey@weil.com

Jan Ellen Ellard jellard@orrick.com Edward Robert Reines Edward.Reines@weil.com

Jason Sheffield Angell jangell@orrick.com Matthew D. Powers matthew.powers@weil.com

Kaiwen Tseng ktseng@orrick.com 

Mark Shean mshean@orrick.com

Robert E. Freitas rfreitas@orrick.com

Vickie L. Feeman vfeeman@orrick.com

Counsel for intervenor, Texas Instruments, Inc., C-05-00334

Kelli A. Crouch kcrouch@jonesday.com

Counsel for intervenor, United States Department of Justice, C-00-20905

Eugene S. Litvinoff eugene.litvinoff@usdoj.gov

May Lee Heye may.heye@usdoj.gov

Nathanael M. Cousins nat.cousins@usdoj.gov

Niall Edmund Lynch Niall.Lynch@USDOJ.GOV

Counsel for intervenor, Elpida Memory, Inc., C-00-20905 and C-05-00334

Eric R. Lamison elamison@kirkland.com

John J. Feldhaus jfeldhaus@foley.com

Counsel are responsible for distributing copies of this document to co-counsel that have not

registered for e-filing under the court's CM/ECF program in each action.

Dated: 2/19/08 TSF

Chambers of Judge Whyte

Case 5:06-cv-00244-RMW Document 900 Filed 02/19/08 Page 8 of 8