SST (Microchip) Assigned Patent

Sub volt flash memory system

Silicon Storage Technology, Inc., San Jose, CA, acquired by Microchip Technology in April, 2010, has been assigned a patent (8,300,494) developed by four co-inventors for a "sub volt flash memory system."

The co-inventors are Hieu Van Tran, San Jose, CA, Sang T. Nguyen, Union City, CA, Anh Ly, San Jose, CA, and Hung Q. Nguyen, Fremont, CA.

The abstract of the patent published by the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office states: "Various circuits include MOS transistors that have a bulk voltage terminal for receiving a bulk voltage that is different from a supply voltage and ground. The bulk voltage may be selectively set so that some MOS transistors have a bulk voltage set to the supply voltage or ground and other MOS transistors have a bulk voltage that is different. The bulk voltage may be set to forward or reverse bias pn junctions in the MOS transistor. The various circuits include comparators, operational amplifiers, sensing circuits, decoding circuits and the other circuits. The circuits may be included in a memory system."

The patent application was filed on Dec. 28, 2010 (12/980,209).