Taiwan monitor makers facing legal action...02.20.2001-Primasia News-Taiwan

Primasia News, Taiwan

02.20.2001
Taiwan monitor makers facing legal action

Digitimes reports British PC maker Elonex has filed a lawsuit against 22 monitor manufacturers for not paying royalties on use of its power saving patent Display Power Management Signalling (DPMS).
Of the 22 monitor makers, 10 are Taiwanese companies: ACM (2352 'Ming Ji'), Lite-On Tech (2346 'Yuan Xing'), Amtran (5405 'Rui Xuan'), Compal (2324 'Ren Bao'), Delta (2308 'Tai Da Dian'), ADI (2304 'Cheng Zhou'), Tatung (2371 'Da Tong'), Chuntex (2320 'Zhong Qiang'), Jean (2442 'Mei Qi') and Kuo Feng (2334 'Guo Feng'). Other leading monitor makers such as Apple (US), Compaq (US), NEC (Japan) and LG (Korea) were also listed.
Elonex has indicated that some monitors makers, including Samsung (Korea), HP (US), Philips (Holland) and Hitachi (Japan) have signed contracts with the company permitting them to use its power saving patent. It is difficult to gauge the impact on the Taiwanese monitor makers. Some of the companies have told us they are not well informed of the lawsuit and have not received any formal notification.
Lite-On Tech is to pay a 25% stock and 5% cash dividend, lower than market expectations of an overall 40% dividend.