Contingencies

12 Months Ended

Sep. 30, 2011

Product Warranty Obligation/Commitments/Contingencies [Abstract]

CONTINGENCIES

16. CONTINGENCIES

Initial Public Offering Securities Litigation

On April 19, 2002, a consolidated amended class action complaint was filed in the United States District Court for the Southern District of New York asserting claims relating to the initial public offering (“IPO”) of our subsidiary NetSilicon, Inc. and approximately 300 other public companies. We acquired NetSilicon on February 13, 2002. The complaint names us as a defendant along with NetSilicon, certain of its officers and certain underwriters involved in NetSilicon’s IPO, among numerous others, and asserts, among other things, that NetSilicon’s IPO prospectus and registration statement violated federal securities laws because they contained material misrepresentations and/or omissions regarding the conduct of NetSilicon’s IPO underwriters in allocating shares in NetSilicon’s IPO to the underwriters’ customers. We believe that the claims against the NetSilicon defendants are without merit and have defended the litigation vigorously. Pursuant to a stipulation between the parties, the two named officers were dismissed from the lawsuit, without prejudice, on October 9, 2002.

As previously disclosed, the parties advised the District Court on February 25, 2009 that they had reached an agreement-in-principle to settle the litigation in its entirety. A stipulation of settlement was filed with the District Court on April 2, 2009. On June 9, 2009, the District Court preliminarily approved the proposed global settlement. Notice was provided to the class, and a settlement fairness hearing, at which members of the class had an opportunity to object to the proposed settlement, was held on September 10, 2009. On October 6, 2009, the District Court issued an order granting final approval to the settlement. Ten appeals initially were filed objecting to the definition of the settlement class and fairness of the settlement. Five of those appeals were dismissed with prejudice on October 6, 2010. On May 17, 2011, the Court of Appeals dismissed four of the remaining appeals and remanded the final appeal to the District Court to determine whether the appellant has standing to object to the settlement. On August 25, 2011, the District Court ruled that the last remaining objector lacks standing to object to the settlement. That objector has appealed that ruling to the Court of Appeals, and the plaintiffs have moved to dismiss that appeal.

Under the settlement, our insurers are to pay the full amount of settlement share allocated to us, and we would bear no financial liability beyond our deductible of $250,000 per claim. While there can be no guarantee as to the ultimate outcome of this pending lawsuit, we expect that our liability insurance will be adequate to cover any potential unfavorable outcome, less the applicable deductible per claim. As of September 30, 2011, we have an accrued liability for the anticipated settlement of $300,000, which we believe is adequate and reflects the amount of loss that is probable, and a receivable related to the insurance proceeds of $50,000. This $50,000 represents the anticipated settlement of $300,000 less our $250,000 deductible. In the event we should have losses that exceed the limits of the liability insurance, the losses could have a material adverse effect on our business and our consolidated results of operations or financial condition.

Patent Infringement Lawsuits

On March 16, 2011, MOSAID Technologies Incorporated filed a complaint naming us as defendants in federal court in the Eastern District of Texas. The complaint included allegations against us and 32 other companies pertaining to the infringement of six patents by products compliant with various Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers standards for implementing wireless local area network computer communications in certain frequency bands. On September 30, 2011 we reached a settlement involving a royalty-bearing license agreement for future sales of licensed products sold during the term of the agreement. We do not expect this license agreement to have a material impact on our consolidated financial statements.

On January 18, 2011, Advanced Processor Technologies LLC filed a complaint naming us as a defendant in federal court in the Eastern District of Texas. The complaint included allegations against us and eight other companies pertaining to the infringement of two patents by products containing data processors with memory management units. On October 17, 2011, we settled the lawsuit for $0.2 million which was recorded during the fourth quarter of fiscal 2011 (see Note 18 to our consolidated financial statements).

On May 11, 2010, SIPCO, LLC filed a complaint naming us as a defendant in federal court in the Eastern District of Texas. This claim subsequently has been moved to the Northern District of Georgia. The complaint included allegations against us and five other companies pertaining to the infringement of SIPCO’s patents by wireless mesh networking and multi-port networking products. The complaint seeks monetary and non-monetary relief. We cannot predict the outcome of these matters or estimate a range of loss at this time or whether it will have a materially adverse impact on our business prospects and our consolidated financial condition, results of operations or cash flow.

In addition to the matters discussed above, in the normal course of business, we are subject to various claims and litigation, including patent infringement and intellectual property claims. Our management expects that these various claims and litigation will not have a material adverse effect on our consolidated results of operations or financial condition.