Avant! Corp looks like it’s won the next round in its continuing battle against its bitter rival Cadence Design Systems Inc. Shares in the company soared by over 40% as news broke that a judge had indicated that the company’s Aquarius cell-based place and route products would not be enjoined in the legal dispute which has stopped Avant! selling its older ArcCell semiconductor design tool (CI No 3,256). An official ruling is expected to follow in a week or so. Aquarius replaced the ArcCell product, which a San Francisco court decided used software code that infringed the copyright of Cadence’s Design Framework II product. Avant! has denied the claims. Cadence further argued that Aquarius, which still accounts for a substantial portion of Avant!’s revenues, was essentially ArcCell renamed. The judge indicated that Avant! could go ahead and market Aquarius, although the case will continue, with Cadence having to prove that Aquarius is substantially similar. Meanwhile, Avant! is scrabbling to migrate its user base over to the successor product to Aquarius, called Apollo, which nevertheless may also be drawn into the argument.
