UII Sets the Record Straight On Frivolous Lawsuit By Lexmark Corp.

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UII Sets the Record Straight On Frivolous Lawsuit By Lexmark Corporation.

Lexmark Uses its Patents As Collateral Leverage On A Loan From The Chinese Government To Keep The Company In Business. This Case is Simply An Attack On The Remanufactured Cartridge industry.
By Steven Miller. 

This all began when Apex China tried to buy UII out of supplying chips to the remanufacturing industry, and UII refused.  Remanufacturers remember, not long ago, Apex and its daughter company, Static Control, shockingly raised prices over 300% overnight without warning on Lexmark and private label chips and, within weeks, completely stopped supplying these chips to remanufacturers, leaving the remanufacturing industry no option to supply their customers until UII released its MS/MX/CS/CX chips a few weeks later.  Make no mistake, this case is not about IP infringement, it is about Lexmark’s parent company, Apex China, trying to complete their goal of shutting down the Lexmark remanufacturing industry and forcing remanufacturers to become resellers of finished cartridges.
 

Lexmark originally brought this case in order to make a deal with one of UII’s vendors, On Semiconductor, to no longer supply UII with a critical custom component.  Lexmark’s strategy could have worked, but UII was able to quickly re-develop the critical component with a new supplier by grossly overpaying for high development and expedite fees in order to not interrupt the supply of chips to the remanufacturing industry.  Now Lexmark is stuck with this case that they never wanted to actually pursue in court, as it was only intended to be a tactic to cut off a critical component for UII.  This is why Lexmark filed the case in April 2018 and did not serve it for many months.  Lexmark delayed the case for a year in hopes of reaching a settlement with UII that could have been devastating to the remanufacturing industry.  Apex-SCC China is attempting any method to shut down the Lexmark remanufacturing industry, and any company that purchases Apex-SCC China Lexmark chips is fueling the company that wants to put remanufacturers out of business.

There is no upside to this case for Lexmark.  UII’s team has demonstrated for nearly two decades that it develops non-infringing chips, respecting others’ IP.  UII’s chips do not infringe Lexmark’s patents, so there is no concern of infringement.  However, Lexmark recently had to use its patents as collateral on a loan from China to keep Lexmark in business, and now this case is going to put the patents in jeopardy that are supporting the borrowed money that is keeping Lexmark’s doors open.
 

Meanwhile, at least every MS/MX/CS/CX cartridge, imaging unit, and printer that Lexmark has sold for the past six years is infringing UII’s patent directed toward chip security. In the end, Lexmark is going to waste time and spend an enormous amount of its borrowed money to pursue a frivolous case that they never intended to fight, while the patents supporting their loans will be under attack. The real case going forward will be how devastating the lawsuit against Lexmark will be for infringing UII’s patent.  

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April 2, 2019 at 1:21 PM