The government-funded Industrial Technology Research Institute (ITRI, 工研院) denied yesterday that its patent lawsuit settlement with Samsung Electronics Co last year has negatively affected the interests of Taiwanese companies.
However, ITRI president Shyu Jyuo-min (徐爵民) refused to disclose the details of the settlement, citing confidentiality.
The ITRI’s denial came after Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) Legislator Pan Men-an (潘孟安) yesterday accused the Hsinchu-based research institute of signing unfair agreements with Samsung to settle several patent lawsuits, citing a report by the Chinese-language Wealth Magazine (財訊).
Photo: Chang Chia-ming, Taipei Times
The magazine reported that the settlement could affect patent rights that local companies, including flat panel maker AU Optronics Corp (友達光電), purchased from the institute.
In June and October of 2009, the ITRI filed a total of seven patent infringement lawsuits against Samsung and its US unit with a US court in Arkansas.
Citing the magazine report, Pan told a press conference yesterday that the ITRI settled the lawsuits with Samsung last year for less than NT$2 billion (US$70 million), while authorizing Samsung to use more than 100 of its patents.
However, under the settlement, the ITRI also signed an agreement with Samsung not to sue, agreeing not to pursue its patent claims against the South Korean firm in the fields of consumer electronics, flat-panel displays, -communications and semiconductors where the institute now owns patents or is applying for patents over the next six years, Pan said, citing the magazine report.
If the ITRI sells these patents to a third party, the third party should also not sue Samsung, according to the report.
Pan said the number of patents included in the covenant not to sue accounted for about two-thirds of the ITRI’s roughly 14,000 patents, worth more than NT$10 billion.
As these patents are valid for 20 years, the signing of the agreement not to sue would mean Taiwanese firms could not pursue patent claims against Samsung for the next 26 years, thus posing a huge threat to local electronics firms, Pan said.
Pan said he would ask the Ministry of Economic Affairs and the ITRI to submit a special report on the settlement to the legislature.
In response, Shyu said that the ITRI did not agree to sell patents involved in the settlement exclusively to Samsung when it reached the deal last year with the South Korean company, which is seen as a rival by local electronics companies. Nor did the ITRI ink any deal with Samsung on cross-licensing, he added.
In a statement, the ITRI described the accusation as “false” and said that it has continued to work closely with local companies in patent lawsuits and technology development.
The ITRI, which said it was considering taking legal action against Wealth Magazine, said the report has caused a “major impact” on the ITRI’s ongoing lawsuit against LG Electronics Inc of South Korea.
IN THE AIR: While most companies said they were committed to North American operations, some added that production and costs would depend on the outcome of a US trade probe Leading local contract electronics makers Wistron Corp (緯創), Quanta Computer Inc (廣達), Inventec Corp (英業達) and Compal Electronics Inc (仁寶) are to maintain their North American expansion plans, despite Washington’s 20 percent tariff on Taiwanese goods. Wistron said it has long maintained a presence in the US, while distributing production across Taiwan, North America, Southeast Asia and Europe. The company is in talks with customers to align capacity with their site preferences, a company official told the Taipei Times by telephone on Friday. The company is still in talks with clients over who would bear the tariff costs, with the outcome pending further
A proposed 100 percent tariff on chip imports announced by US President Donald Trump could shift more of Taiwan’s semiconductor production overseas, a Taiwan Institute of Economic Research (TIER) researcher said yesterday. Trump’s tariff policy will accelerate the global semiconductor industry’s pace to establish roots in the US, leading to higher supply chain costs and ultimately raising prices of consumer electronics and creating uncertainty for future market demand, Arisa Liu (劉佩真) at the institute’s Taiwan Industry Economics Database said in a telephone interview. Trump’s move signals his intention to "restore the glory of the US semiconductor industry," Liu noted, saying that
STILL UNCLEAR: Several aspects of the policy still need to be clarified, such as whether the exemptions would expand to related products, PwC Taiwan warned The TAIEX surged yesterday, led by gains in Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電), after US President Donald Trump announced a sweeping 100 percent tariff on imported semiconductors — while exempting companies operating or building plants in the US, which includes TSMC. The benchmark index jumped 556.41 points, or 2.37 percent, to close at 24,003.77, breaching the 24,000-point level and hitting its highest close this year, Taiwan Stock Exchange (TWSE) data showed. TSMC rose NT$55, or 4.89 percent, to close at a record NT$1,180, as the company is already investing heavily in a multibillion-dollar plant in Arizona that led investors to assume
AI: Softbank’s stake increases in Nvidia and TSMC reflect Masayoshi Son’s effort to gain a foothold in key nodes of the AI value chain, from chip design to data infrastructure Softbank Group Corp is building up stakes in Nvidia Corp and Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電), the latest reflection of founder Masayoshi Son’s focus on the tools and hardware underpinning artificial intelligence (AI). The Japanese technology investor raised its stake in Nvidia to about US$3 billion by the end of March, up from US$1 billion in the prior quarter, regulatory filings showed. It bought about US$330 million worth of TSMC shares and US$170 million in Oracle Corp, they showed. Softbank’s signature Vision Fund has also monetized almost US$2 billion of public and private assets in the first half of this year,
RSS