A yes vote means that DC-WG recommends that OVI should accept
the strawman, while a no vote means that DC-WG recommends that
OVI should not accept the strawman.
Votes will be taken via email to the reflector between 1/5 and
1/18. (The agenda for the DC-WG teleconference incorrectly
said between 1/5 and 1/11.) Each DC-WG participant gets one vote,
not one vote per company. A simple majority is required, although
consensus is desirable, as always. Results will be reviewed at the
1/19 teleconference.
Following is a summary of the terms of the donation:
Cadence will continue to own the copyright on the Ambit Constraint
Language spec, but will license OVI and its members (i.e., the DC-WG
members) to use the spec in developing the DC-WG standard.
OVI will own the copyright for any modifications to the spec.
Since DC-WG will be using the Ambit Constraint Language spec
as a strawman to create an entirely new document, OVI will
completely own the copyright for the DC-WG standard.
Since the DC-WG standard will be based in part on intellectual
property described by the Cadence/Ambit donation, the DC-WG standard
should include a statement (near the OVI copyright notice) that the
standard may potentially be subject to patents owned by Cadence in
particular, or in general to patents owned by other companies.
Although Cadence does not currently anticipate that this will
be an issue, should there be any Cadence/Ambit patents that cover
the contents of the Ambit Constraint Language spec, and those
patents also cover the contents of the DC-WG standard, Cadence
will cross-license related patents with any company that wants
to use the standard.
The patent and copyright issues are completely independent.
Including a statement about potential patent issues
- is consistent with IEEE policy
- does not indicate any need to get a copyright license from
Cadence in order to use the standard
- does not affect whether getting a patent license from
Cadence or other companies is necessary.
If Cadence or any other company has a patent related to the DC-WG
standard and chooses to enforce it, then companies that want to
use the DC-WG standard will have to license the patent from its
owner. Potentially, the patent owner could refuse to license a
particular company or charge excessive license fees. Cadence is
committing up front that, if necessary, it will cross-license any
related patents without a fee.
Mark
-- Mark Hahn phone: (408) 428-5399 Architect, Deep Submicron Business Unit fax: (408) 428-5959 Cadence Design Systems email: mhahn@cadence.com