SST (Microchip) Assigned Patent

Silicon Storage Technology, Inc., San Jose, CA, has been assigned a patent (8804,429) developed by four co-inventors for a “non-volatile memory device and a method of programming such device.”

The co-inventors are Hieu Van Tran, San Jose, CA, Hung Quoc Nguyen, Fremont, CA, Anh Ly, and Thuan Vu, San Jose, CA.

The abstract of the patent published by the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office states: “A non-volatile memory device has a charge pump for providing a programming current and an array of non-volatile memory cells. Each memory cell of the array is programmed by the programming current from the charge pump. The array of non-volatile memory cells is partitioned into a plurality of units, with each unit comprising a plurality of memory cells. An indicator memory cell is associated with each unit of non-volatile memory cells. A programming circuit programs the memory cells of each unit using the programming current, when fifty percent or less of the memory cells of each unit is to be programmed, and programs the inverse of the memory cells of each unit and the indicator memory cell associated with each unit, using the programming current, when more than fifty percent of the memory cells of each unit is to be programmed.“

The patent application was filed on Dec. 8, 2011 (13/315,213).