United States District Court Orders Dismissal of Inphi Versus Netlist Patent Infringement Lawsuit

IRVINE, Calif., April 21, 2011 /PRNewswire/ -- Netlist, Inc. (NASDAQ: NLST), a designer and manufacturer of high-performance memory subsystems, today said the patent infringement lawsuit filed by Santa Clara, CA-based Inphi Corporation, a high speed analog semiconductor company, against Netlist has been dismissed without prejudice. The lawsuit filed on November 30, 2009, in the U.S. Central District of California, Western Division followed a patent infringement lawsuit Netlist filed against Inphi on September 22, 2009.

"We are pleased with the court's order to dismiss Inphi's complaint against Netlist," said C.K. Hong, President and CEO of Netlist. "We believe our robust portfolio of intellectual property uniquely addresses the memory capacity and performance challenges our customers face in cloud computing, virtualization and high performance computing. We will continue to aggressively defend our patent rights."

Netlist's ongoing federal litigation against Inphi Corporation alleges that Inphi's iMB line of isolation memory buffer integrated circuits infringe Netlist's U.S. Patent Nos. 7,532,537, 7,636,274 and 7,619,912. Netlist is seeking unspecified monetary damages and has requested an injunction barring Inphi from infringing and inducing others to infringe any of the claims of the '537, '274 and '912 patents.

About Netlist:

Netlist, Inc. designs and manufactures high-performance, logic-based memory subsystems for datacenter server and high-performance computing and communications markets. Netlist's flagship products include HyperCloud Memory, which breaks traditional memory barriers and NetVault, a flash memory-based subsystem that enables data retention weeks following a disaster. The memory technologies are developed for applications in which high-speed, high-capacity memory, enhanced functionality, small form factor, and heat dissipation are key requirements. These applications include tower-servers, rack-mounted servers, blade servers, high-performance computing clusters, engineering workstations, and telecommunication equipment. Founded in 2000, Netlist is headquartered in Irvine, California with manufacturing facilities in Suzhou, People's Republic of China. For more information, visit the company's website at www.netlist.com.

Safe Harbor Statement:

This news release contains forward-looking statements regarding future events and the future performance of Netlist. These forward-looking statements involve risks and uncertainties that could cause actual results to differ materially from those expected or projected. These risks and uncertainties include, but are not limited to, continuing development, qualification and volume production of EXPRESSvault™, NVvault™ and HyperCloud™; the rapidly-changing nature of technology; risks associated with intellectual property, including the costs and unpredictability of litigation over infringement of our intellectual property and the possibility of the Company's patents being re-examined by the United States Patent and Trademark office; volatility in the pricing of DRAM ICs and NAND; changes in and uncertainty of customer acceptance of, and demand for, our existing products and products under development, including uncertainty of and/or delays in product orders and product qualifications; delays in the Company's and its customers' product releases and development; introductions of new products by competitors; changes in end-user demand for technology solutions; the Company's ability to attract and retain skilled personnel; the Company's reliance on suppliers of critical components; fluctuations in the market price of critical components; evolving industry standards; and the political and regulatory environment in the People's Republic of China. Other risks and uncertainties are described in the Company's annual report on Form 10-K, dated March 3, 2011, and subsequent filings with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission made by the Company from time to time. Except as required by law, Netlist undertakes no obligation to publicly update or revise any forward-looking statements, whether as a result of new information, future events or otherwise.

SOURCE Netlist, Inc.