Tech licensor Rambus to start selling chips under own brand

(Reuters) - Tech licensing company Rambus Inc said it would start selling chips under its own brand, a move aimed at reducing its dependence on income from litigation to defend its patents.

Shares of the company, known for its years of aggressive patent lawsuit battles against chipmakers, were up slightly in premarket trading on Monday.

Rambus said the memory chips are designed to improve the performance of server systems used by businesses and data centers and that it was currently shipping samples of the chips, called RB26, to potential customers.

Instead of manufacturing the chips itself, Rambus will hire specialists to make them, the Wall Street Journal reported on Sunday, adding that commercial production would start later this year.

Rambus, founded in 1990, started developing technologies to make high-speed memory chips and decided to license them to other companies.

Manufacturers not agreeing to pay license fee were sued by the company for infringement. Rambus has waged years of patent wars with chipmakers such as Micron Technology Inc, Nvidia Corp and SK Hynix.

(Reporting by Abhirup Roy in Bengaluru; Editing by Saumyadeb Chakrabarty)