A report in the UK publication New Scientist suggests that a row is brewing over who invented the spherical microchips under development by Dallas, Texas company Ball Semiconductor (CI No 3,441). It made this forecast after the publicationÆs sleuths discovered the first patents on the technology were filed by AAKI Semiconductor, also from Dallas, Texas. It seems a remarkable coincidence that a technology to create semiconductors on 1mm spheres in a single, enclosed process and dramatically cut the cost – and waste – of present production processes should have been dreamed up by two companies in the same place at the same time. The fact, however, is that the row will never happen. AAKI was the name used by the people behind Ball before they switched to a title that described what the company is about. The patents, like everything else, were rolled into the new company.
