Things are not calming down in the semiconductor industry. Memory technologies, which have gained vital importance especially with the artificial intelligence revolution, are once again pitting giant companies against each other in courtrooms.

California-based memory and storage technologies manufacturer Netlist announced that it has filed a new patent infringement suit against South Korean technology giant Samsung Electronics.

The targets include High Bandwidth Memory (HBM) and DDR5 products that power today’s artificial intelligence servers and advanced accelerators.

These complaints, which were brought to the US International Trade Committee (ITC) and the Eastern District Court of Texas, have the potential to create a major shake-up in the supply chain of the hardware world.

The case concerns not only Samsung, but also indirectly the biggest players in the industry, such as Google, Nvidia, Supermicro and Broadcom.

The Heart of Artificial Intelligence Chips is in the Target

The rapidly growing branch of artificial intelligence requires faster memory chips than ever before to instantly process huge sets of information.

At the center of the lawsuit filed by Netlist are two critical patents that make these high-performance memories possible.

The first patent allegedly infringed (No. 12,646,537) covers silicon vias (TSV) technology, which allows stacking memory chips vertically and reduces power problems.

This innovation directly targets the HBM production processes from which Samsung generates the most revenue.

The other patent (No. 12,650,937) contains details about the registered clock driver (RCD) technology that enables DDR5 memory modules to operate without problems at high speeds.

These hardware, used in advanced server memories such as RDIMM and MRDIMM, constitute the main fuel of the artificial intelligence market.

In short, Netlist argues that these architectures, which are at the heart of contemporary information centers and provide terabytes of data flow per second, are being used without its permission.

Silicon Valley Giants Are Also Under Investigation

What makes the situation even more complicated is that the case targets not only the hardware manufacturer, but also the technology giants that use that hardware.

Netlist’s complaint petition submitted to ITC includes the biggest names in the sector such as Google, Nvidia, Broadcom and Supermicro.

Google’s self-developed TPU artificial intelligence processors, Nvidia’s new generation Blackwell and Rubin graphics units, and Supermicro’s massive server systems are largely dependent on these memory chips produced by Samsung.

Netlist is asking the court for import bans and retraining orders.

If these demands are accepted, the products in question may be banned from entering the US market and there may be an irreparable crisis in the global artificial intelligence hardware supply chain.

The Endless Legal Struggle Between Samsung and Netlist

The tension between the two companies is actually not a new situation. Netlist, which specializes in memory modules and information storage systems, signed a licensing agreement with Samsung in 2015.

However, in 2020, disputes over the terms of this agreement dragged things into an irreversible legal war.

Samsung suffered heavy blows in similar cases in the past.

The Texas court panel decided that different Netlist patents were deliberately violated and imposed a compensation penalty of $ 303 million in 2023 and $ 118 million in late 2024.

The huge demand for HBM chips in AI training and inference processes has been driving the profitability of Samsung’s memory department to its peak in recent years.

Companies like Nvidia are starving for this memory for every artificial intelligence chip they produce.

In his statement on the subject, Netlist CEO CK Hong emphasizes that these legal steps are essential to protect innovations in the field of artificial intelligence server memory against unauthorized use.

South Korean giant Samsung, on the other hand, states that its products are fully compliant with the law and that they will defend themselves strongly.

However, it is known that the ITC acts and makes decisions much faster than standard courts.

For this reason, a possible precautionary measure or import ban decision that may be issued in the next few months is expected to have major commercial consequences in the artificial intelligence industry.