ITC victory keeps U.S. market open for Mitsubishi wind turbines

Finnegan represented Mitsubishi Heavy Industries, Ltd. and Mitsubishi Power Systems America, Inc. against General Electric in a U.S. International Trade Commission investigation. The ITC ruled in favor of Mitsubishi, terminating a Section 337 investigation based on a General Electric complaint alleging patent infringement by Mitsubishi’s 2.4 Megawatt variable speed wind turbines. The Commission ruling of no violation overturned an earlier finding by an ITC administrative law judge that two of GE’s patents had been violated. The result of the ruling was that Mitsubishi remained free to import and sell its wind turbines in the U.S. market. GE appealed that ITC ruling to the Federal Circuit, which affirmed that ITC’s decision on one of the three patents involved, dismissed the appeal regarding one patent which had expired during the appeal process, and remanded the matter to the Federal Circuit for reconsideration of certain issues regarding the third patent at issue. During the reconsideration process GE and MHI reached a settlement of their overall dispute, and have moved the ITC to dismiss the remanded action. The result of all this is that the ITC took no action to disturb MHI’s imports. The settlement resulted in a license of GE’s world wide wind turbine technology to MHI.