According to public information, there are nearly 2,000 companies in Shenzhen engaged in the research, development, production and application of LED technology and products, accounting for about 30% of the number of LED companies in the country. However, most of them belong to the technical field of LED packaging and application, and there are few manufacturers of chips, semiconductor materials, and phosphors. Technology, processes, equipment and key raw materials all need to be introduced.
According to our reporter’s understanding, the current upstream core patented technologies of LED are mainly monopolized by well-known European, American and Japanese manufacturers such as Nichia, Philips, Osram, Toyoda Gosei, and Cree of the United States.
"In the past year, the number of Chinese LED companies that have encountered patent litigation has increased significantly." Intellectual property lawyer Xu Zhibing said that currently, the biggest victims of the patent war are Taiwanese manufacturers, but for Shenzhen LED companies, since 70% are in overseas markets, with the gradual release of production capacity, market competition has become increasingly fierce, and it is difficult to avoid the patent quagmire.
"Moreover, the methods of patent wars are not limited to simple litigation." Lawyer Xu said that many foreign competitors with patents will directly send legal letters to overseas downstream customers of Chinese LED companies suspected of infringement. These customers often stop purchasing Chinese LED products because they are afraid of joint liability.
On January 20, Wang Dingfeng, chairman of Huizhou Guozhan Electronics Co., Ltd., filed a complaint against a well-known LED company in Longgang, Shenzhen. Request the court to order the defendant to immediately stop infringing on one of its invention patents and pay 10 million yuan in compensation. Some intellectual property lawyers said that such lawsuits are just the tip of the iceberg of the hidden dangers of low-level competition in this industry. The core patented technology of LED has always been monopolized by European, American and Japanese manufacturers. If practical and effective measures are not taken quickly, more and more LED companies will face the same patent quagmire.
According to preliminary statistics, as of June last year, Shenzhen’s LED patent applications reached 17,373, accounting for about 40% of the province’s total. However, nearly 50% of the patents are in packaging and applications in the midstream and downstream of the industry, while in epitaxy and chips in the upstream of the industry, patents account for a smaller proportion.
Moreover, Shenzhen’s LED patents are mostly peripheral patents, and there is a lack of core patents. In particular, patents such as white light, heat balance issues of high-power LED lamps, and long-lasting and efficient phosphors have been monopolized by Europe, the United States, and Japan. For Shenzhen companies to break through this patent barrier, they need to make breakthrough progress in technical routes or key materials.
It is understood that companies with core patents have more than half of their core patents authorized in my country, and the protection scope of peripheral patents applied for domestically falls within the protection scope of foreign patents. Therefore, domestic enterprises have great patent risks. These companies use their respective core patents to expand horizontally (entering multiple countries at the same time) and vertically (continuously improving designs and making follow-up applications), and have deployed a tight patent network around the world. For latecomers to the LED industry like Shenzhen, development is greatly hampered by patents.
Yin Hanfan, chairman of the Shenzhen Intellectual Property Research Association, said: "The risks are reflected in the following aspects: First, without basic patents, it is easy to lose the commanding heights of the market, and sooner or later the bulk of the profits will be taken away by others; if we do not increase research and development efforts and supplement them, Using other favorable measures, such as striving to obtain more favorable licensing agreements and establishing closer domestic alliances, we may face the same difficulties encountered by other industries; secondly, there are few invention patents; low patent coverage; thirdly, insufficient continuous application efforts. "
Anna
Anna