Silicon Graphics Files Suit Against ATI

Just days after exiting Chapter 11 bankruptcy, SGI has filed suit in US District Court in western Wisconsin against ATI alleging that the Radeon series of graphics cards infringes upon patents that the company has licensed to ATI competitors.

ATI, which is currently being acquired by chip-maker AMD, declined to comment on the lawsuit, though SGI's CEO Dennis McKenna said in a statement, "SGI has licensed this technology to ATI's major competitors and, as I have previously been stating publicly, SGI intends to aggressively protect and enforce its intellectual property." The patent in question is described in its abstract as "A floating point rasterization and frame buffer in a computer system graphics program."

Silicon Graphics has been making significant moves this week in the wake of exiting Chapter 11, having also announced on Monday that it would begin trading on the Nasdaq, distributing 11 million new shares.