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News

23 July 2007

 

US appeal court temporarily blocks ITC’s exclusion order on Epistar

The US Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit (CAFC) has temporarily stayed the enforcement of a limited exclusion order issued by the US International Trade Commission (ITC) barring the importation into the USA of the AlGaInP-based omni-directional mirror adhesion (OMA), metal bond (MB), and glue bond (GB) LEDs (and next-generation OMA II, MB II and GB II LEDs) of Epistar Corp of Hsinchu, Taiwan, as well as packaged lamps containing the LEDs, and boards consisting mainly of arrays of such lamps.

Epistar filed its appeal on 13 July after t he exclusion order came into force following a 60-day period of US Presidential review of the ITC’s final determination, on 9 May, that the LEDs infringe US Patent no. 5,008,718 owned by Philips Lumileds Lighting of San Jose, CA, USA.

The CAFC has also granted Epistar’s request for an expedited response from the ITC. “Epistar has always maintained that the ITC decision was incorrect, both factually and legally,” says Epistar’s president B.J. Lee. “We understand the CAFC rarely grants such a stay and are cautiously optimistic that the court will also grant a permanent stay while Epistar’s appeal is litigated.”

Epistar also says that its new Phoenix and Aquarius ultra-high-brightness LED products are now available for shipping. Designed to remove features and structures found in the previous designs of Epistar’s ultra-bright AlGaInP OMA, MB and GB and OMA II, MB II and GB II products that the ITC believes infringe the Lumileds patent, Epistar claims that its new products are outside the scope of the exclusion order.

See related items:

ITC’s US exclusion order comes into force on Epistar’s MB, GB and OMA LEDs, just as new Phoenix and Aquarius LEDs launched …

ITC adopts exclusion order against Epistar's MB LEDs; will review whether OMA and GB LEDs also infringe Lumileds patent

Round two: Epistar responds to Philips Lumileds

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

Visit: http://www.epistar.com.tw