Rambus Gets Nasdaq Delisting Threat

Staff Reporter -- Electronic News, 8/17/2006

Add Rambus to the list of companies recently threatened with Nasdaq delisting for failing to file their quarterly reports on time.

The company disclosed on Wednesday that it had received a letter from Nasdaq threatening the delisting. Los Altos, Calif.-based Rambus said it would request a hearing before the Nasdaq Listings Qualification Panel, effectively staying any delisting pending the hearing.

Rambus received the notice because it failed to file its quarterly report on the Form 10-K for the period ended June 30 by the deadline.  Rambus has delayed filing the report due to an ongoing investigation by its board’s audit committee to review the company’s historical stock option grant practices.

Rambus did not offer an estimate of when the quarterly report would be filed, but said “the company will make every effort to file its restated financial reports as soon as practicable after the completion of the investigation.”

The notice marked another event in what has been a tough week for the company. One of the members of its board of directors and a former CEO of the company, Geoff Tate, resigned, Rambus announced Wednesday.

Tate served as CEO from 1990 through 2005.  Rambus has said that it plans restate its previously issued financial statements for the periods affected by options backdating -- a period during which Tate was CEO and the sole member of the stock option committee.

And late last month the embattled Rambus agreed to accept a lowered damage award stemming from its lawsuit with Hynix, and separately the company said that John Danforth, senior VP and general counsel, would step down from that position, effective immediately, and serve as senior legal advisor.

Rambus has been no stranger to the courtroom, having spent years embroiled in patent disputes and antitrust cases against semiconductor memory makers.

Rambus provides IP, specifically for memory interconnect, to the semiconductor industry.