Remember Vitesse Semiconductor?

Vitesse is the Camarillo company that had been among the first players to be investigated by the SEC and the Justice Department in connection with backdating stock options. An internal inquiry turned up accounting tricks, and three of its top executives were fired. Now comes the resignations of two directors: James Cole and Moshe Gavrielov. Shareholders have honed in on Cole because he was on Vitesse's auditing, compensation and corporate governance committees - and presumably should have known what was going on. Cole said his leaving had nothing to do with pressure from shareholders. "The company seems to be coming through most of its problems and has a good road map going forward," he told the Ventura County Star. "You don't want to leave when things are bad, ever. Things are improving in a nice way. It's a good time to make changes."

Well, that's one perspective. A couple of weeks back, Vitesse accused its former auditor, KPMG, of negligence and deceit, along with aiding former Vitesse employees in issuing "misleading audit opinions." It's the first time a company with stock-options problems has sued its auditor. Until recently, attorneys for both companies were working together to defend against shareholder litigation, according to the Daily Journal. So what happened with all those investigations? Good question. Actually, many of those companies being investigated by the feds seem to be in limbo land as the SEC and Justice Department figure out how to handle the backdating issue. Meanwhile, Vitesse has been delisted from the Nasdaq because it has not filed quarterly financial reports since early 2006.