Apr. 28, 2015
Substantial Victory in Patent Lawsuit Against NPE
On April 20, 2015, United States District Court for the Northern District of California granted the Order Dismissing Defendants Nichia Corporation and Nichia America Corporation (collectively “Nichia”) in the Civil Case No. 3:12-cv-00059-SI. By this Order, the patent infringement case filed by Bluestone Innovation, LLC (“Bluestone”) against Nichia was dismissed with prejudice, in which Bluestone asserted the United States Patent No. 6,163,557 (the “557 Patent”). Other than the dismissal of its defenses and counterclaims without prejudice, Nichia owes no obligations in this dismissal, including any payments to Bluestone.
For nearly 5 years since the case was originally filed in the Eastern District of Texas by Bluestone’s predecessor and affiliate of Bluestone, Bluestone Innovations Texas, LLC, Nichia has been vigorously vindicating itself throughout the case. Bluestone refers to itself as a patent licensing and enforcement company, which is also known as non-practicing entity (“NPE”). Dismissal of the infringement claim by an NPE without any payment is a substantial victory for Nichia. This case illustrates Nichia’s uncompromising policy against the patent claims lacking merit, even through a lengthy legal battle against an NPE.
The 557 Patent was originally assigned to Xerox Corporation, which later was acquired by Bluestone. The case originally involved a number of LED companies including Epistar Corporation, Formosa Epitaxy, Huga Optotech Inc., Showa Denko K.K., and Toyoda Gosei Co., Ltd., among others, as the defendants. Nichia was the only remaining Defendant in the case as of the dismissal. Bluestone has also asserted the 557 Patent in a separate lawsuit against a number of end-users of LEDs, including LG Electronics, Inc., Acer Inc., Vizio, Inc., Best Buy Co., Inc., among others.
Contact information;
Public Relations, Nichia Corporation
Tel:+81-884-22-2311
Fax:+81-884-23-7752