Three months ago Transmeta launched its first ever high-profile lawsuit against Intel Corporation. At that time, Transmeta had recently made the transition from a company that offers low-power chips to one that that licenses patents and performs R&D. With licensing as its primary source of income, it was only natural for Transmeta to file a lawsuit sooner or later.

Transmeta filed its lawsuit against Intel alleging that Intel’s entire x86 microprocessor line, all the way back to the Pentium Pro to its present day offerings, infringed on one or more of eleven total patents held by Transmeta. Transmeta went on to say that Intel had made over $100 billion on the processors pertaining to its patents and requested the court for treble damages (meaning that if they win they will be awarded triple the cost of the actual damages), attorney's fees, and a licensing deal.

Intel finally responded to the lawsuit earlier this week by countersuing Transmeta. The countersuit alleges that Transmeta has breached seven patents held by Intel, most of which deal with methods to control and reduce power consumption. Intel accuses Transmeta of breaching its following patents: 5,745,375; 5,617,554; 5,802,605; 5,819,101; 5,881,275; 6,385,634; 6,418,529. The countersuit centers on Transmeta’s Crusoe, Efficeon and Efficeon 2 brands.

In addition to the the lawsuit, Intel found a total of eleven defenses against Transmeta’s lawsuit:

1. Non infringement
2. Invalidity
3. Obviousness type double patenting
4. Prosecution history estoppel
5. The doctrine of laches
6. License (sic)
7. Equitable estoppel
8. Ownership
9. Marking
10. Inequitable conduct and infectious unenforceability
11. The doctrine of unclean hands

As of yet, Transmeta has not commented on Intel’s countersuit, which was jointly filed with its response to Transmeta’s opening lawsuit.