Intel, S3 in pact-Intel gains access to Exponential patents?

Eitan Shefer writes " I have a nice scoop. hehe.. so far no news source picked this one up.. back in the old days, of the pre-Jobs-intrim-headed Apple, Apple invested in a new CPU company called Exponential, which claimed to have made very fast Power-pc based CPU (up to 500mhz At 0.6 micron, which is amazing, if true.). Apple, under Jobs decided not to use Exponential's chips, a decision which pretty much killed exponential since very few potential clients for PPC desktop CPUs existed at that time (or still do). Exponential also wrote a few patents that were rather interesting to other CPU makers (X86 emulation in 64bit architecture, for example, which Intel would be interested in.). Exponential died, and, in the end the patents were bought by S3. The same S3 today has announced that they have entered into a 10-year cross license deal with Intel, giving Intel (and S3) access to each other's patents. Click below to read the press release. "

S3 Announces 10-Year Cross Licensing Agreement With Intel Intel to Purchase Warrants for S3 Shares S3 to be an Intel AGP 4X Validation Partner SANTA CLARA, Calif.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Dec. 17, 1998--S3 Inc. (Nasdaq:SIII - news) today announced a long-term agreement with Intel Corp. (Nasdaq:INTC - news) which includes a 10-year cross-license agreement for all S3 and Intel patents for development of certain semiconductor products, a bus license for current and future Intel general purpose processors, and the selection of S3 as an Intel AGP 4X validation partner.