May 30, 2006 > ITC commences investigation of Toshiba based on Lexar complaint

FREMONT (Business Wire), May 11_Lexar Media, Inc. (Nasdaq: LEXR), a world leader in advanced digital media technologies, today announced that the U.S. International Trade Commission (ITC) has voted to commence an investigation into whether Toshiba Corporation, Toshiba America, Inc., and Toshiba America Electronic Components, Inc., are infringing three Lexar patents. The products being investigated include Toshiba's flash chips and flash cards, including among others: Toshiba's 16-gigabit multi-level cell NAND flash chips; Toshiba's 8-gigabit single level cell and multi-level cell NAND flash chips; Toshiba's 4-gigabit multi-level cell NAND flash chips and Toshiba's 1-gigabit single level cell NAND flash chips. This is the first step towards possible U.S. government action to exclude certain of Toshiba's NAND flash chips and cards from the U.S. market.

Lexar, in a complaint filed with the ITC on April 11, 2006, is seeking all possible relief, including a permanent exclusion order to bar the importation into the United States of Toshiba's infringing NAND flash chips and cards, as well as products that incorporate Toshiba's infringing chips. Additionally, Lexar's complaint requests a cease-and-desist order to bar further sales and distribution of infringing products that have already been imported into the United States by Toshiba.

The case has been referred to ITC Administrative Law Judge Robert L. Barton, Jr., who will schedule and hold an evidentiary hearing and then render an initial determination. Judge Barton is expected to issue this initial determination sometime early to mid-next year. The ITC is then likely to hand down its final determination during the third quarter of 2007.

Certain of the patented technology at issue in this complaint is related to the technology that a jury, after a six-week trial in March 2005, found Toshiba had misappropriated from Lexar. That case is now on appeal.

More information is available at www.lexar.com.