Intel Wins Round in Intergraph Case, Sues Broadcom

The chip maker Intel Corp. won another victory in its battle with Intergraph Corp. when the U.S. District Court in Birmingham, Ala., said Intel didn’t violate antitrust laws when it withheld information from Intergraph after the Huntsville, Ala.-based company threatened to file a patent suit. An injunction forcing Santa Clara-based Intel to give Intergraph access to product information was granted in 1998 but was overturned in November by the U.S. Court of Appeals.

Meanwhile, Intel has filed a lawsuit against Broadcom Corp. for allegedly stealing trade secrets by hiring three key employees with confidential knowledge of Intel’s ethernet network products. Officials at Irvine-based Broadcom, a maker of chips for digital cable-TV set-top boxes, declined to comment on the suit, filed in Santa Clara County Superior Court. Shares of Intel rose $1.94 to close at $122.13, Intergraph fell 9 cents to $6.97 and Broadcom fell $13.06 to $230, all on Nasdaq.