A German Appeals Court has upheld a lower court's earlier decision in favor of The Siemon Company in a lawsuit in which BKS alleged infringement of its European Patent Number 809,331.
In 2001, BKS sued The Siemon Company in Germany alleging that the TERA connector infringed this European patent. BKS lost that case with the German court ruling that there was no patent infringement. BKS later filed an appeal in an attempt to change the ruling. The German court, however, rejected this appeal and has dismissed the BKS' lawsuit.
This ruling in Europe that Siemon's TERA connector is not an infringement of the BKS patent follows a similar ruling in the United States Courts that the TERA does not infringe BKS' corresponding U.S. Patent 5,895,292.
"The Siemon Company respects the patent rights of its competitors. We are not at all surprised that the courts have ruled in Siemon's favor," says Michael Cantor, a partner at Cantor Colburn LLP, Siemon's intellectual property attorneys.
With the dismissal of the BKS lawsuits, international standards which cover the connector interface that is used in the TERA connector were published and specified for Category 7/Class F cabling. The resultant ISO and IEC publications provide positive confirmation of the technical superiority of the TERA interface, which may now be used throughout the world in full compliance with international standards.
"As a leader and innovator in the structured cabling industry, we were always confident that the Siemon TERA connector was not an infringement of any BKS patent," says John Siemon, vice president of engineering for The Siemon Company. "We are therefore particularly pleased that the courts in both Germany and the United States have ruled in our favor. The TERA connector, together with its significant technical features and performance, will benefit the structured cabling industry globally."
The Siemon Company, based in Watertown, CT, manufactures copper and optical fiber cabling systems and components. For more information visit www.siemon.com.
