MEDIA INFORMATION - STEELBRO LOSE APPEAL
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Date:Tuesday, 15 June 2010
Christchurch firm STEELBRO has lost a two-year legal battle defending claims against Swedish Sidelifter manufacturer Hammar Maskin that it infringed on one of its patents.
STEELBRO managing director John Steel said he was disappointed and surprised given that the company had initially won its case in the High Court. “The facts are that STEELBRO won in the High court. This decision was subsequently overturned in the Court of Appeal on what we regard to be a very narrow and technical point of construction of the patent.”
“The patent in question refers to the stabilizer leg angle on only one of the five different crane models that STEELBRO take to market. “It is a small part of one version of our Sidelifter products that we no longer even manufacture.”
Steel says that in terms of its product range the decision will have no impact on either the performance of its products or the company’s ability to develop innovative and world- leading Sidelifter products.
“We have already stopped offering this stabilizer leg version and are offering the same crane with a different leg,” he said.
“STEELBRO takes pride in the many innovations it has introduced into its range of products,” continued Steel. “The stabilizer leg being stored at an angle had been considered in our engineering calculations prior to the Hammar patent, however our team regarded the change as something obvious rather than something sufficiently inventive to be worthy of a patent.
“Ironically, Hammar’s patent had all the features of a traditional STEELBRO stabilizer leg but added a bearing and stored it at an angle. STEELBRO did not add the bearing but did store the stabilizer legs at an angle.”
Steel said that technical experts in the original court case decided that the absence of the bearing meant that the company had not infringed the patent. In the appeal they decided that the absence of the bearing was not a factor, even though it was one of the integers of the patent.
“The matter was one of legal interpretation and we were astounded that a very clearly defined ingredient of the patent was deemed unnecessary,” said Steel. “We are disappointed that the Supreme Court did not consider the issues to be of sufficient public importance to justify leave to appeal.
As it was a split trial there are further issues that remain to be determined by the High Court. The proceeding will continue to be defended by STEELBRO.