In a bid to bring products to market faster, IBM Corp teamed up with 3Com Corp yesterday to announce a cross-licensing deal under which both companies will gain access to the other’s networking and communications patents. The deal, worth almost $1bn, is an extension of the seven year relationship between the two firms that has already resulted in numerous joint efforts including the IBM 8260 multiprocessor hubs, IBM 8271 Ethernet LAN switches as well as PC modems, network interface cards (NICs) and IBM’s custom chip development for 3Com’s CoreBuilder switches. Recently, IBM also announced that 3Com would be using the PowerPC 405GP to reduce system-on-a-chip design and development time.
3Com will be licensing several thousand patents from IBM including technologies for server access, load balancing, web caching, ATM/Ethernet/Token ring technologies, NICs and network management, policy-based networking and virtual private networking patents, among others. The networking vendor says it is particularly interested in IBM’s modem and NIC technology, which it will use to beef up its own portfolio in this space, which has seen slow growth and dwindling revenues recently.
The deal is a significant coup for 3Com as IBM is believed to hold the most networking patents in the industry, generating almost 9,000 over the past five years. The joint efforts of the two companies will result in new technologies to access networked information in new creative ways, said Bruce Claflin, president and CEO of 3Com and former head of IBM’s PC business. By sharing patents, 3Com and IBM have greater freedom to develop new products and compete in new market segments, he added, although he declined to give any further details about specific markets or products.
IBM gains hardware and software patents for handheld organizers, NICs, analog and digital modem technology, network hubs, broadband access technology, routers and switches, voice over IP and LAN technology. The move appears to make less sense for IBM, who has most of the above markets pretty much covered already. Michel Mayer, general manager of IBM’s networking hardware division refused to say how IBM intends to use 3Com’s technology, adding: We want to increase revenue by getting our innovations out of the IBM research division and into the marketplace faster. He did, however, disclose that IBM would be looking at integrating Tivoli’s enterprise network management platform with 3Com’s Palm handheld computer, reminiscent of a deal between Computer Associates and Palm last month. CA’s partnership with 3Com is intended to enable IT managers to deploy, manage and support the installation and upgrade of Palm Computing applications, files, and operating systems, so that users can synchronize Palm devices with a Unicenter TNG server, eliminating the need for manual software installation.
