A Threat to Samsung Electronics' QLED TV
A patent infringement lawsuit has been filed against Samsung’s quantum dot (QD) technology, the essential part of technology for Samsung Electronics' QLED TV.
According to the display industry on Feb. 17, Nanoco, a British QD-based company, filed a patent lawsuit against Samsung Electronics in the Eastern Texas Court on Feb. 14. A quantum dot is a nanometer-sized semiconductor particle that can produce light precisely and can improve energy efficiency and image quality simultaneously.
The defendants in this case are Samsung Electronics, Samsung Electronics' Visual Display (VD) Business Division, Samsung Electronics USA, the Samsung Advanced Institute of Technology, and Samsung Display.
Samsung collaborated with Nanoco on LCD module material technology in 2010, and at that time, Nanoco revealed related technologies such as providing quantum dot samples to Samsung, Nanoco said. Since then, Samsung unveiled its first TV with quantum dot technology at the CES 2015 and has increased its TV market share by launching QLED TVs in 2017. In this process, Nanoco claimed, that Samsung Electronics ramped up its sales with QLED TVs manufactured through a total of five patents of its own without receiving permission from Nanoco.
In 2016, "We can preemptively prepare for a potential patent litigation," Samsung Electronics said while acquiring the intellectual property right from QD Vision of the United States
QD Vision went through a liquidation process shortly after the sale of its assets. Currently, global quantum dot companies include Nanoco and Nanosys of the United States. Nanosys also collaborated with Samsung Electronics on research on quantum dot materials.