Nanoco has provided an update on the litigation against Samsung for the alleged wilful infringement of the group’s IP. The US Patent Trial and Appeal Board (PTAB) has agreed to Samsung’s request to review the validity of the five patents in the case. In our view, this development does not significantly swing the likely outcome of the court case one way or the other, although it could delay the final outcome by a number of months.
It is very common for a company defending a patent infringement claim to contest the validity of the patents in the court case and through the parallel PTAB process, as Samsung is doing here. The PTAB’s decision does not mean these patents are invalid, just that it has agreed to review them. The evidential burden required to instigate an inter partes review (IPR) of a patent is relatively low. Each of the five patents being contested contains a number, in some cases more than 20, of ‘claims’ that can be challenged.
Nanoco Group PLC (LON:NANO) leads the world in the research, development and large-scale manufacture of heavy metal-free nanomaterials for use in displays, lighting, vertical farming, solar energy and bio-imaging.
