Background
Prior to 1984, it was not necessarily illegal to produce a competing chip with an identical layout. As the legislative history for the SCPA explained, patent and copyright protection for chip layouts, or chip topographies, was largely unavailable. This led to considerable complaint by U.S. chip manufacturers—notably, Intel, which, along with the Semiconductor Industry Association (SIA), took the lead in seeking remedial legislation—against what they termed "chip piracy." During the hearings that led to enactment of the SCPA, chip industry representatives asserted that a pirate could for $10,000 copy a chip design that had cost its original manufacturer upwards from $100,000 to design.
Read more about this topic: Semiconductor Chip Protection Act Of 1984
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