Apex Medical Corp (雃博) shares rose yesterday by the daily maximum limit of 7 percent after the respiratory therapy equipment maker announced that it and US-based ResMed Inc had decided to drop all legal action against each other.
Based on a confidential agreement with ResMed, Apex said it has the right to sell its Wizard masks and XT and iCH flow generators globally, and Apex also agreed to dismiss all challenges to ResMed’s patents in the US, Europe, Germany, Japan and China. The equipment is used to treat sleep-disordered breathing
“The settlement brings to a conclusion a worldwide legal conflict that began in March last year, when ResMed filed a patent infringement suit against APEX with the US International Trade Commission and in federal court in Los Angeles,” ResMed said in a press release on Thursday.
The settlement came after the US International Trade Commission (ITC) ruled on July 18 that Apex’s Wizard 220 facial mask and XT flow generators do not violate ResMed’s patents, meaning that they can be sold in the US, although the commission deemed the design of the water tank of the iCH flow generator did violate ResMed’s patent.
“Most Taiwanese companies would just pay a large sum of licensing fees when they are faced with such lawsuits, but our chairman thought we would able to defend ourselves,” an Apex official, who declined to be named, said by telephone yesterday. “We would never fight a war that we were bound to lose.”
In the first half of this year, Apex reported a profit of NT$109.28 million (US$3.65 million), or NT$1.31 per share, up 39.17 percent from NT$78.52 million, or NT$0.94 per share, seen the previous year, according to the company’s filing to the Taiwan Stock Exchange.
The settlement would not increase the company’s expenses in any way, the official said. Apex’s expenses for the lawsuit this year would be lower than the NT$70 million it spent last year, with most of the figure for this year already spent, she added.
From January through July, Apex posted revenue of NT$1.38 billion, up 17.88 percent from the NT$1.17 billion recorded a year ago.
The company did not expect the settlement to increase its revenue for this year significantly as Apex still needed to organize retail routes in the US and Europe, the official said.
Shares of Apex soared 6.98 percent yesterday to NT$52.1, outperforming the TAIEX, which was down 0.22 percent.
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