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BEIJING

Recently, the Supreme People’s Court of China has made the final judgment on the case concerning the patent infringement dispute between Societe d’ Elastographie Impulsionnelle pour les Systemes de Mesure de l’ Elasticite (hereinafter referred to as “SEISME”; a subsidiary of a French company Echosens) and Wuxi HISKY Medical Technologies Co., Ltd. (hereinafter referred to as “HISKY”), finding that HISKY products did not infringe the patent of SEISME at all, dismissing all the claims filed by SEISME, and ordering SEISME to assume all the litigation costs for the first trial and the second trial.

According to the verdict, the key to this case is the patent of “Imaging Method and Device Using Shear Waves” held by SEISME. In February 2016, SEISME initiated a lawsuit in the Beijing Intellectual Property Court of China, on the grounds that the technical solution of the FibroTouch products manufactured and sold by HISKY fell within the scope of protection of such patent.

Echosens’ subsidiary company, SEISME eventually lost the case, as ruled by the Supreme People’s Court. According to the final judgment made by the Supreme People’s Court, the technical features of HISKY products are neither identical with nor equivalent to those of such patent. Thus, the technical solution of the FibroTouch products of HISKY does not fall within the scope of protection of the disputed patent, and does not infringe the patent of SEISME at all. The disputed patent adopted the technical solution of “simultaneous observation + full receiving ”, while HISKY products adopted the technical solution of “delayed observation + partial receiving”. The technical routes of the two solutions are significantly different from each other, serving as an important basis for the Supreme People’s Court to make the final judgment.

Besides, the Patent No. ZL00805083.X held in China by SEISME, a subsidiary of Echosens, already expired on March 13, 2020. The patents owned by Echosens’s subsidiaries that expired at the same time also include Patents No. US6770033, No. P4349750, No. CA2366265, No. AU762374, No. IL145352, No. IN244875 and No. ZA20017552 in the United States, Japan, Canada, Australia, Israel, India and South Africa, as well as Patents No. DE60028952T2, No. AT331216T, No. FR2791136A1, No. ES2267506T, No. PT1169636E, etc. under the European patent family No. EP1169636 in Germany, Austria, France, Spain, Portugal, Belgium, Denmark, Cyprus, Finland, United Kingdom, Ireland, Italy, Luxembourg, Greece, Netherlands, Switzerland, Sweden and other countries.

Earlier, Shanghai Echosens Medical Equipment Technology Co., Ltd. (hereinafter referred to as “Echosens (Shanghai)”) and Fu-Rui Corporation, parent company of Echosens, (hereinafter referred to as “Fu-Rui”), were found fabricating facts and committing business defaming against their opponent HISKY. According to the judgment made by the Supreme People’s Court for another case, the foregoing business defaming behaviours of Echosens (Shanghai) and Fu-Rui include: fabricating information; sending lawyer’s letters and letters of notice containing misleading expressions to the opponent’s target clients and dealers; false statements delivered by senior executives publicly; damaging the goodwill of the opponent. In the final trial, the Supreme Peoples’ Court ruled that the behaviours of Echosens (Shanghai) and Fu-Rui were illegal and had constituted business defaming to HISKY, ordering them to stop the relevant defaming behaviours immediately and submit written materials to over ten hospitals to eliminate the adverse influence and make compensation to HISKY for its losses.

Since then, the patent litigation dispute between the two parties has ended in HISKY’s victory. Up to now, HISKY has applied for nearly 300 patents and more than 180 trademarks worldwide. It is one of the companies possessing the most intellectual property rights in this field in the world. More than 1500 HISKY products have been deployed worldwide to help millions of patients for liver diagnosis.

View source version on businesswire.com: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20200721006011/en/