A federal court for the district of Virginia found in favor of Toshiba Corp in a patent infringement suit brought by Li Second Family Co of the US, according to the Nihon Keizai Shimbun. The court found that the US company had improperly obtained the patent in question and was thus incapable of claiming any rights to the patent. Li sued the Japanese manufacturing giant in March for up to $100m, claiming that Toshiba had infringed on its patent, granted in 1990 in the US, on technology for preventing electron leakage from inside microchip devices. The disputed technology is believed to have been licensed to 13 Japanese, US, European and South Korean chip companies, including Intel Corp, Oki Electric Industry Co and Samsung Electronics Co. The US firm had intended, if it won its suit against Toshiba, to force chip makers which have been using the technology without a license from Li, to pay patent royalties.
