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Columbia Professor Emerita in Landmark LED Patent Case Reviewing New Companies for Possible Inclusion in ITC Action

Columbia University Professor Emerita Gertrude Neumark Rothschild has been approached by several companies that were not named in the U.S. International Trade Commission case but which have expressed interest in reaching licensing agreements. Several agreements have been reached.

Professor Rothschild already has reached licensing deals with companies including Sony Corp., Sanyo Electric Co. Ltd., Seoul Semiconductor Co. Ltd., LG Electronics Inc., Lucky Light Electronics Co. Ltd., Everlight Electronics Co. Ltd., Samsung Electro-Mechanical, Seiwa Electric Mfg. Co., Ltd., Shenzhen Unilight Electronic Co. Ltd., Guangzhou Hongli Opto-Electronic Co. Ltd., Samsung Electro-Mechanics Co., Ltd., Samsung Electronics Co., Ltd., and Lite-On, Inc. Details of the agreements were not released.

Dreier LLP Intellectual Property partners Albert L. Jacobs, Jr. and Daniel Ladow are representing Professor Rothschild in her complaint to the ITC, which seeks to block the imports of infringing products, including video players using Blu-ray format, cell phones and various consumer products containing blue, green, violet, ultraviolet, and white light emitting diodes and laser diodes.

"We have been asked to review which other companies should be added to the ITC action," Mr. Jacobs stated. "We have found several companies which we believe can and should be added. While doing that we remain open to discussions, both with respondents and those not yet in the action."

The ITC agreed in March to hear Professor Rothschild's complaint, which named a total of 31 companies. Other companies named in the suit include Hitachi Ltd., Matsushita Electric Industrial Co., Nokia Corp., Samsung Group, Sharp Corp. and Toshiba Corp.

Professor Rothschild, who is the sole owner of the patent, conducted landmark research in the 1980s and 1990s into the electrical and optical properties of so-called wide band-gap semiconductors that has proven pivotal in the development of short-wavelength light emitting diodes and laser diodes that are now widely used in consumer electronics.

She was issued a U.S. patent in 1993 that covers a method of producing wide band-gap semiconductors for LEDs and LDs in the blue, green, violet and ultraviolet end of the spectrum. Such LEDs and LDs have become increasingly popular in a variety of devices as a superior efficient lighting source because of their reduced power consumption, greater reliability and longevity.

While her patent is not limited to gallium nitride-based semiconductor material in LEDs and laser diodes, the total market for all types of gallium nitride devices alone has been forecast at $7.2 billion for 2009.

Earlier this year, Professor Rothschild was honored by Philips Electronics, which endowed the new Philips Electronics Chair in the Department of Applied Physics at the Fu Foundation School of Engineering and Applied Science at Columbia University. Recognized by the American Physical Society as a Notable Woman Physicist in 1998, Professor Rothschild was elected as a Fellow of the American Physical Society in 1982.

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SOURCE Dreier LLP