News

9 January 2007

 

Round two: Epistar responds to Philips Lumileds

Epistar Corp of Hsinchu, Taiwan has responded to Philips Lumileds’ statement that a ruling from the Administrative Law Judge (ALJ) of the United States International Trade Commission favours its position, by saying that the judgement only relates to an ancillary product line. Furthermore, in his Initial Determination on January 8, 2007, Administrative Law Judge (ALJ) Sidney Harris of the United States International Trade Commission (ITC) found that Epistar’s Omnidirectional Mirror Adhesion (OMA) and Glue Bond (GB) LEDs do not infringe the three patents asserted by Lumileds.

Philips Lumileds filed a complaint with the ITC in November 2005, alleging that Epistar’s OMA LEDs and the GB and Metal Bond (MB) LEDs of United Epitaxy Corp. (UEC) infringed its U.S. patents 5,376,580, 5,502,316 and 5,008,718. On December 31, 2005, Epistar and UEC merged, and Epistar became the sole respondent in the lawsuit.

According to Epistar, the judge found that its OMA and GB LEDs do not infringe any of the asserted claims of the three patents. It was also found that Epistar’s MB LEDs do not infringe any of the asserted claims of the 5,376,580 or 5,502,316 patents. However, the judge did find that Epistar’s MB LEDs infringe two claims of the 5,008,718 patent. In response to this, Epistar said that the MB product line is a legacy of the Epistar-UEC merger, and that it is about o go into production with a new generation of MB series LEDs, which it believes will not infringe patent 5,008,718. The company adds that even if the ITC adopts the judge’s infringement finding regarding its MB LEDs, the impact on the business will be negligible. Despite this, Epistar will petition the ITC to reject the judge’s Initial Determination. A Final Determination by the ITC is expected on May 8, 2007.

“Epistar and UEC developed these High-Brightness AlGaInP LEDs using its own proprietary technology, and they are significantly different from the claims of the asserted patents and the LEDs developed by Lumileds. Epistar has at all times been confident that Lumileds’s claims were without merit, and looks forward to competing fairly with Lumileds in the marketplace,” said Epistar president Dr B.J. Lee.

See related item:

Judge's Initial Determination favours Philips Lumileds in patent infringement battle

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