Chinese consumer electronics giant Aigo wins patent suit against Toshiba

11 Oct 2011

A Chinese court ordered Japanese electronics major Toshiba Corp to pay 200,000 yen ($31,000) in damages to Beijing Huaqi Information Digital Technology, known by its brand name Aigo for infringing of the Chinese consumer electronics giant's patents on storage port technology.

The Xi'an People's Court ordered Japanese electronics major Toshiba to stop selling some of its notebook computers in China for infringing six of Aigo patents for USB Plus, a storage port technology used in Toshiba's laptop and notebook computers, the Financial Times today reported.

Although filed in China, these six patents of Aigo are valid in member countries of the Patent Co-operation treaty.

In April 2010, Zhong Guan Cun, Beijing-based Aigo filed patent infringement suits in Chinese courts against Toshiba and Hewlett-Packard (HP), after these multinational companies failed to respond to its March letter to enter into negotiations.

Aigo said that many other companies like Dell, Samsung and Sony have also infringed on its storage port technology patents, but it does intend suing all of them.

According to the lawsuit, Aigo had demanded 1 million yuan ($146,000) in compensation from Toshiba and HP.