Kokusai Electric and Eugene Tech Co., Ltd., which are competing in the domestic semiconductor equipment market, are meeting in court. Eugene Tech, which is being sued for patent infringement, is known to have successfully developed a product through patent-evading design with the support of the Korean Intellectual Property Office in the past, so there are concerns about the repercussions of this lawsuit.

Kokusai Electric Co., Ltd., a Japanese advanced semiconductor equipment manufacturer, announced on the 5th that it, together with its Korean subsidiary International Electric Korea, filed a patent infringement lawsuit against Eugene Tech, a domestic semiconductor equipment manufacturer, at the Seoul Central District Court in Korea.

This patent infringement lawsuit includes four Kokusai Electric Group patented technologies related to substrate processing devices, etc.

The four patents included in the complaint list batch deposition devices, including the Harrier-L and Harrier-M, as representative infringing products.

According to our paper's coverage, the patents are understood to belong to the following categories: △Substrate processing device and semiconductor device manufacturing method △Substrate processing device, semiconductor device manufacturing method and recording medium △Substrate processing device, semiconductor device manufacturing method, plasma generation unit, program, plasma generation method, electrode and reaction tube △Semiconductor device manufacturing method, substrate processing device and program, etc.

Previous patents appear to include technologies for facilitating the supply of gas between adjacent substrates without reducing the number of substrates that can be processed in batches, technologies for reducing the footprint while securing a maintenance area, and technologies for determining plasma abnormalities.

International Electric Korea stated that the patent rights were registered not only in Korea but also in the United States, Japan, Taiwan, and China from 2011 to 2022, and that International Electric Korea, a Korean subsidiary of Kokusai Electric, is the only patent holder in Korea.

Prior to this lawsuit, Kokusai Electric notified Eugene Tech of the intellectual property infringement and attempted to resolve the issue amicably, but was unsuccessful and filed the lawsuit.The company stated that it was sorry for the inconvenience and that it would do its best to minimize the impact of this lawsuit on its customers’ product production.

Kokusai Electric stated, “In order for the semiconductor industry to advance through technological innovation, intellectual property rights, which are the result of companies’ fierce technological development efforts, must be protected and respected. This is a principle that all countries and industries around the world agree on,” and added, “The Kokusai Electric Group will actively act to uphold this principle going forward.”

International Electric Korea has Samsung Electronics and SK Hynix as its major customers in Korea, and Eugene Tech, which is being sued, is also known to be competing for the same customers in the same batch deposition equipment market.

Eugene Tech has been working on the localization of batch deposition equipment since the late 2010s, and with the support of the Korean Intellectual Property Office's 'Patent-based Research and Development Project', it has been reported that it has successfully developed related equipment through patent avoidance designs in the early stages of R&D through analysis of competitors' technologies, including those in the United States.

Meanwhile, when the news of Eugene Tech's lawsuit was reported, Eugene Tech's stock price fell by -15% on the same day, sending shockwaves through the market.

Meanwhile, Kokusai Electric Co., Ltd. is a Japanese semiconductor equipment manufacturing company listed on the Tokyo Stock Exchange in October 2023. Since establishing its Korean production corporation, International Electric Korea, in 1993, it has been engaged in the semiconductor equipment manufacturing business in Korea for over 30 years.

International Electric Korea has its headquarters and production base in Cheonan, Chungcheongnam-do, Korea, and operates customer support offices in Pyeongtaek, Icheon, etc. Currently, approximately 400 employees are working, and sales in 2022 amount to approximately KRW 400 billion. Recently, we are expanding the domestic market by investing in large-scale development and installing evaluation facilities in the Jinwi Industrial Complex in Pyeongtaek.