Sony has won a major victory with a Dutch court lifting the injunction that saw a halt to shipments of PS3's into Europe and the seizure of thousands of consoles. All PS3 units that were seized have been released back to Sony. According to a GameIndustry.biz report, 300,000 units were seized at a value of €43 million.
With the latest ruling of the court in the Hague, the focus has shifted onto LG, who won a prejudgment injunction and seizure order against Sony for alleged patent infringement related to Blu-Ray. Now the court has ordered LG to pay a fine of €130,000. For every day LG doesn't pay it will be fined an additional €200,000.
Sony plans to move another nine shipments (15,000-20,000 units each) into Europe - in addition to the 300,000 units already enroute.
GameIndustry.biz says that the "latest order only concerns the pre-judgment seizure and not the wider ongoing case, in which LG is seeking a royalty payment of between $2.50-$2.55 for each Blu-ray device sold by Sony."
Source: GI.biz
Comments
Re: European PS3 Injunction Lifted, LG Fined
@Neneko
According to The Inquisitr, the fine is to cover costs associated with the seizure:
"While LG had the right to have customs seize any materials they believed to be infringing upon their patents for a period of 10 days, they also assumed responsibility for any costs incurred if they could not prove that such infringement occurred within that time period."
Also, it appears the trigger for the additional 200,000 fine would not be the non-payment of the fine but the non-delivery of the seized units: "If all seized units are not returned within a 24 hour period LG will also be forced to pay 200,000 euros per day until they arrive back in the hands of Sony officials."
Re: European PS3 Injunction Lifted, LG Fined
Wait.. they have to pay a fine for a court agreeing with them? I.. I am missing something here.