Rambus said today that NEC has signed a licensing agreement with it for next generation Direct RDRAM memory as well as licensing patents for synchronous memory and double data rate (DDR) memory.

The acknowledgement is a major coup for Rambus. NEC is one of the biggest of the Dramurai, along with Toshiba, which has already licensed this technology from the intellectual property (IP) company.

According to Rambus, the next generation of 1066MHz Rambus memory will give a 33 per cent edge over the current generation of 800MHz RIMM memory.

NEC has had a close relationship with Rambus from the very beginning. Rambus is currently in litigation with Micron, Infineon and Hyundai, all of which are considerable players in the market.

This latest will put pressure on all three of these firms, which insist Rambus does not own patents on SDRAM or DDR memory. ®