ATL sued Zhuhai Guanyu for more than 100 million yuan!

(ATL) of Ningde New Energy Technology Co., Ltd. is suing Zhuhai Guanyu (688772.SH), the first company to land in Zhuhai, which has attracted a lot of attention, according to a report from Enterprise Patent Watch on January 17.

The two outstanding companies in the field of consumer batteries went to court because of patents.

4. "the case has been filed and has not yet been heard."

On January 7, Zhuhai Guanyu issued a "notice on the progress of the company's involvement in litigation", which said that the litigation stage of the case was "the case has been filed and has not yet been heard."

The current basic situation of the case is as follows: Zhuhai Guanyu received on January 5, 2022 from the Fuzhou Intermediate people's Court of Fujian Province about Dongguan New Energy Technology Co., Ltd., Ningde New Energy Technology Co., Ltd. sue the company and Chongqing Guanyu Battery, a wholly-owned subsidiary, "Civil complaint" and other related materials.

There are four litigation cases involved in Zhuhai Guanyu, including:

Case 1: Dongguan New Energy Technology Co., Ltd. as the plaintiff, Zhuhai Guanyu as the first defendant. Patent number involved: ZL201220359889.9 (patent for utility model).

Case 2: Dongguan New Energy Technology Co., Ltd., Ningde New Energy Technology Co., Ltd. as plaintiffs, Zhuhai Guanyu as the first defendant. Patent number involved: ZL201410782528.9 (patent for invention).

Case 3: Ningde New Energy Technology Co., Ltd. as the plaintiff, Zhuhai Guanyu as the first defendant. Patent number involved: ZL201420789403.4 (patent for utility model).

Case 4: Ningde New Energy Technology Co., Ltd. as the plaintiff, Zhuhai Guanyu as the first defendant, Chongqing Guanyu battery as the second defendant. Patent number involved: ZL201720090970.4 (patent for utility model).

Zhuhai Guanyu notice pointed out that the above case involves a total of three end-customer products, corresponding to the company's three battery models.

The influence on Zhuhai Guanyu

In an announcement on January 7, Zhuhai Guanyu responded to the impact of the lawsuit. Vico Lithium believes that the most important thing is: "even if the company loses the lawsuit in the future and stops producing and selling related products, the relevant production capacity can also be converted to produce other series of products or new series of products to meet the market demand for the company's products."

Zhuhai Guanyu further pointed out: "during the period from January to September 2021, the sales revenue of the company's products involved in the complaint accounted for less than 2% of the company's total revenue."

At the same time, Zhuhai Guanyu stressed that the case involved in this announcement has not yet been heard, the final judgment is still uncertain, and it is not possible to predict the impact on the company's current and post-period profits and losses, and the final actual impact shall be subject to the effective judgment of the court.

Zhuhai Guanyu said that the company will pay close attention to and attach great importance to the matter, actively respond to the lawsuit, advocate its own legitimate rights and interests in accordance with the law, and take relevant legal measures to effectively safeguard the company's reputation and the interests of shareholders.

The announcement also pointed out that the "reply from issuers and sponsor institutions on the implementation of feedback on the issue registration process" disclosed on the website of the Shanghai Stock Exchange on September 6, 2021, question 3, the reply from the ATL patent lawyer ", disclosed the basic situation and early progress of the patent dispute with ATL.

Zhuhai Guanyu is expected to pay compensation of about 134 million.

In the question description of "reply from ATL Patent lawyer's letter", Zhuhai Guanyu received an "infringement notification letter" from a domestic lawyer entrusted by Ningde New Energy Technology Co., Ltd. on June 22nd, 2021.

On June 28th, 2021, ATL and its subsidiary Ningde New Energy Technology Co., Ltd., Dongguan New Energy Technology Co., Ltd. entrusted by American lawyers sent infringement notification email.

The reason is that Zhuhai Guanyu produces and sells a variety of lithium battery battery products suitable for notebooks and mobile phones suspected of infringing 11 patents held by ATL related subjects, requiring the company to immediately stop the infringement, conduct technical comparison and analysis of ATL patents and suspected infringing products, appoint representatives to contact lawyers or ATL entrusted by ATL, confirm the scope of infringing products, and negotiate on stopping infringement and compensation.

By comparison, Zhuhai Guanyu believes that the above 11 patents involve a total of 19 end-customer products, corresponding to 13 battery models of the issuer. Without explicitly asking for the amount of compensation in the lawyer's letter, Zhuhai Guanyu believes that even if ATL sues and the issuer loses all cases in the future, the maximum amount of compensation is expected to be the total net profit of selling relevant models of products, that is, 133.6367 million yuan. "

Based on the judgment of 133.6367 million yuan in compensation, "if ATL sues to the court and all issuers lose, Zhuhai Guanyu is still solvent."

It is worth noting that this is only Zhuhai Guanyu's own estimate, and does not rule out the possibility that the amount of compensation proposed by ATL is much higher than this.

As analyzed by Enterprise Patent Watch, "half a year later, Zhuhai Guanyu finally received a" civil complaint "from the Fuzhou Intermediate people's Court, indicating that the negotiations between the two sides did not seem to be going smoothly during this period of time, so ATL escalated the war, from a lawyer's letter directly to a prosecution. The future does not rule out the possibility that Zhuhai Guanyu will continue to receive a lawsuit from ATL from the United States. "

Summary

The patent problem is being paid more and more attention by the rapidly developing lithium power enterprises. After all, if you don't pay attention to patents, lawsuits may follow.

Zhuhai Guanyu's emphasis on patents can be seen from a set of data: in its reply to the inquiry letter on February 2, 2021, Zhuhai Guanyu showed that the number of patents in its territory was 158; in the announcement on January 7, 2022, Zhuhai Guanyu said: "as of December 31, 2021, the company has obtained 634 authorized and valid patents."

At present, a total of 4 cases have been filed, involving 4 related patents, but 11 patents are suspected of infringement in the letter from the ATL patent lawyer.

Will there be new patent cases in the future? How will Zhuhai Guanyu deal with it? Vico Lithium will continue to pay attention.