InfoComm 2014 Gave ‘Safe Haven’ to HDMI Trademark Infringers, Complaint Alleges
The InfoComm 2014 AV show in mid-June gave “safe haven” to exhibitors that are “direct infringers” of HDMI trademarks by letting them market, promote and sell unlicensed HDMI products on the show floor, HDMI Licensing alleged in a complaint filed against InfoComm International, the show’s organizers.
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The complaint was filed Tuesday in U.S. District Court in Las Vegas (http://1.usa.gov/1AGV2YC). HDMI Licensing chose that venue because Las Vegas hosted InfoComm 2014, the complaint said. Usually held in June, the show alternates year to year between Las Vegas and Orlando. InfoComm International is headquartered in Fairfax, Virginia, and HDMI Licensing is based in Sunnyvale, California.
HDMI Licensing representatives roamed the aisles of the 2012 and 2013 InfoComm shows and uncovered dozens of companies marketing HDMI products without a license, the complaint said. Armed with this information, HDMI Licensing “began its preparations for InfoComm 2014 early,” contacting infringing companies listed among the show’s exhibitors through a “polite and informative letter” urging them to come into compliance, it said.
HDMI Licensing also contacted show organizers for help in enforcing the trademarks on the exhibit floor, it said. Instead of landing Infocomm’s cooperation and support, InfoComm lawyers sent HDMI Licensing representatives a cease-and-desist letter weeks before InfoComm 2014 was to open, warning them to stay off show property and threatening to “have you ejected and prosecuted as a trespasser,” the complaint said, quoting from the letter.
"By shielding known direct infringers at their tradeshows from even being investigated, InfoComm has attempted to thwart the ability of HDMI Licensing to even discover the full extent of the damage and harm due to infringement occurring at InfoComm’s tradeshows,” the complaint said. “Given the dramatic increase in exposure that InfoComm offers to these repeat offenders,” through show publicity and other exhibitor support, “the harm to HDMI Licensing is likely much greater than HDMI Licensing even knows at this point,” it said. Unlike InfoComm, CES “works directly with HDMI Licensing and other rightsholders to ensure that intellectual property is protected and that counterfeiters and other direct infringers are not provided with a safe haven to market, promote and sell their infringing goods” on the CES show floor, it said.
The complaint identified seven InfoComm 2014 exhibitors that HDMI Licensing fingered as “repeat” infringers from the InfoComm 2012 and 2013 shows: Aoto Electronics, Beijing Tricolor Technology, Crambo SA (NPG Technology SL), Hangzhou Xianrui Digital Technology, HK Hi-Tech Electronics, Jiangsoo Tsingtoo Technology and Nanjing Doublestar Electronic Technology. “The specific infringers that InfoComm provides services to and affirmatively protects from liability, include a large number of Chinese companies,” the complaint said. “Given the limited ability to effectively enforce HDMI Licensing’s intellectual property rights in China or to enforce a judgment obtained here in China, HDMI Licensing does not name these companies as Defendants."
HDMI Licensing President Steve Venuti didn’t immediately comment whether his entity has similar complaints looming against organizers of other trade shows. InfoComm “acknowledges that it is the subject of a lawsuit that was filed by HDMI Licensing in Federal District Court,” spokeswoman Betsy Jaffe said in an email Friday. “We believe that the suit has no merit, and we will be filing counterclaims.”