Formosa Plastics Corp (台塑), the world's largest producer of polyvinyl chloride (PVC), said yesterday that it has reached a settlement with a US company that filed a lawsuit against the Taiwanese company in August 2004 for infringing on trade secrets.
Under the agreement, Formosa Plastics will pay Hexion Specialty Chemicals Inc US$50 million, according to a filing to the Taiwan Stock Exchange yesterday.
Headquartered in Columbus, Ohio, Hexion is now the world's largest thermosetting resins maker, ahead of the likes of Georgia-Pacific Corp.
Formosa Plastics was actually sued by Resolution Performance Products LLC (RPP), a manufacturer and developer of epoxy resins that was merged into Hexion in April last year, for "unlawful conduct including unfair competition, misappropriation of trade secrets, fraud and conspiracy" in August 2004 in the District Court of Harris County, Texas.
At the time, RPP was seeking at least US$100 million in damages, claiming that Formosa Plastics tried to bribe an employee in Virtual Ideality, a RPP contractor, into unveiling proprietary business process information for making epoxy resins and epichlorohydrin (ECH).
Formosa Plastics said in the statement that it commissioned Virtual Ideality to review the manufacturing process of ECH and recycle the waste in February 2004. Formosa Plastics said it was Virtual Ideality's "inappropriate handling of business" that led to misunderstanding from Hexion, the statement read.
Formosa Plastics' output of ECH and manufacturing efficiency have improved since February 2004, which Hexion believes resulted from utilizing its technology through Virtual Ideality, the statement said.
During the trial process, the judge instructed the two parties to settle,
the statement said. As an appeal could take five to seven years and cost
Formosa Plastics considerable resources, the company decided to consent and
settle with Hexion before the verdict was delivered, according to the
statement.
Hexion agreed to accept US$50 million from Formosa Plastics, and also agreed
not to take any action against Formosa Plastics over the same issue, the
statement said.
Jerry Lin (林勝冠), an executive administrator at Formosa Plastics, said at
a press conference yesterday that the settlement fee will not influence the
company's finances. Instead, the settlement will have a positive effect on
the company's business and product expansion, he said.
Shares of Formosa Plastics dropped NT$1.05 to close at NT$47.8 on the Taiwan
Stock Exchange.
Stephen Garrett, a 27-year-old graduate student, always thought he would study in China, but first the country’s restrictive COVID-19 policies made it nearly impossible and now he has other concerns. The cost is one deterrent, but Garrett is more worried about restrictions on academic freedom and the personal risk of being stranded in China. He is not alone. Only about 700 American students are studying at Chinese universities, down from a peak of nearly 25,000 a decade ago, while there are nearly 300,000 Chinese students at US schools. Some young Americans are discouraged from investing their time in China by what they see
MAJOR DROP: CEO Tim Cook, who is visiting Hanoi, pledged the firm was committed to Vietnam after its smartphone shipments declined 9.6% annually in the first quarter Apple Inc yesterday said it would increase spending on suppliers in Vietnam, a key production hub, as CEO Tim Cook arrived in the country for a two-day visit. The iPhone maker announced the news in a statement on its Web site, but gave no details of how much it would spend or where the money would go. Cook is expected to meet programmers, content creators and students during his visit, online newspaper VnExpress reported. The visit comes as US President Joe Biden’s administration seeks to ramp up Vietnam’s role in the global tech supply chain to reduce the US’ dependence on China. Images on
Taiwan Transport and Storage Corp (TTS, 台灣通運倉儲) yesterday unveiled its first electric tractor unit — manufactured by Volvo Trucks — in a ceremony in Taipei, and said the unit would soon be used to transport cement produced by Taiwan Cement Corp (TCC, 台灣水泥). Both TTS and TCC belong to TCC International Holdings Ltd (台泥國際集團). With the electric tractor unit, the Taipei-based cement firm would become the first in Taiwan to use electric vehicles to transport construction materials. TTS chairman Koo Kung-yi (辜公怡), Volvo Trucks vice president of sales and marketing Johan Selven, TCC president Roman Cheng (程耀輝) and Taikoo Motors Group
New apartments in Taiwan’s major cities are getting smaller, while old apartments are increasingly occupied by older people, many of whom live alone, government data showed. The phenomenon has to do with sharpening unaffordable property prices and an aging population, property brokers said. Apartments with one bedroom that are two years old or older have gained a noticeable presence in the nation’s six special municipalities as well as Hsinchu county and city in the past five years, Evertrust Rehouse Co (永慶房產集團) found, citing data from the government’s real-price transaction platform. In Taipei, apartments with one bedroom accounted for 19 percent of deals last