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Message
From: "H. Peter Anvin" <hpa@z...>
Date: Thu, 22 May 2003 19:51:02 -0700
Subject: Re: [oc] i386 legally
Niclas Hedhman wrote:
>
> 80386 was released ~1987, so patents would be covered for another 8-10 years.
> Exactly what patents there are on the 80386 is hard to know without a search.
>
Again, IANAL, but this is my understanding of things:
a) A patent cannot be filed more than 1 year after the invention was
offered for sale;
b) Patents are valid until 20 years after date of file, *or* 17 years
after date of issue (in the U.S. only and only for patents filed before
some time in the late '90s.)
It's thus unlikely that if a processor was released in 1987 that there
would be any valid patents after 2008.
-hpa
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