Frivolous patent infringement allegations against Daniamant
januar 14, 2013 12:00 pm
Important Legal Notice
In the beginning of November 2011, SIC Divisione Elettronica s.r.l. sent a letter to Daniamant as well as a number of Daniamant’s present customers and distributors. The letter contained a number of unfounded and untrue allegations against Daniamant’s products.
The letter boldly claimed that SIC Divisione Elettronica s.r.l. is the holder of a European patent for “the use of LEDs in emergency warning flashing lifejacket lights”. At the Marine Equipment Trade Show held in mid-November of 2011 in Amsterdam, SIC Divisione Elettronica s.r.l. additionally claimed that SIC Divisione Elettronica s.r.l. is the only company allowed to produce and sell emergency lights using LED technology “in Europe”.
Furthermore, SIC Divisione Elettronica s.r.l. claimed in the letter that if Daniamant’s customers and distributors failed to cooperate they would “condense a plurality of offences ranging from counterfeit of industrial and intellectual property to unfair competition”.
These statements are false and misleading for several reasons. Notably the scope of the patent in question does not cover all LED based emergency lights as claimed and is only issued in four countries in Europe. Most important of all; regardless of the scope of the patent in question Daniamant does not use the technology described in the patent. Specifically:
1) The patent in question is only validated in Austria, Denmark, Italy and Spain but not in Europe as a whole.
2) The patent in question only covers certain types of LED-based emergency lights, and not the general use LEDs in emergency lights.
3) Daniamant’s LED-based products are clearly not of the type described in the patents. Please read the outline below of Daniamant’s legal position on this matter.
4) The patent in question appears to be invalid as the solution described in the patent was described by others prior to the filing of the patent.
Daniamant immediately in 2011 informed SIC Divisione Elettronica s.r.l. of these facts in order to clarify the matter. Daniamant further explained that such frivolous accusations constitutes an act of unfair competition against Daniamant, and will not be tolerated.
Despite this SIC Divisione Elettronica s.r.l recently initiated legal proceedings against an Italian company that had bought a small number of Daniamant products and unsuccessfully attempted to involve Daniamant in the proceedings. We now understand that SIC Divisione Elettronica s.r.l withdrew the proceedings.
Against this background, we wish to inform our distributors and customers that the alleged patent infringement as stated by SIC Divisione Elettronica s.r.l is clearly unfounded, and we note that despite requests to do so SIC Divisione Elettronica s.r.l has never explained on what basis they consider the products to infringe.
We kindly ask our distributors and customers to contact Arne Gillin, Managing Director, by email, or phone should you receive any information on the alleged patent infringement or have any question or queries in this regard.
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