Legal standing of Classen megaloc patent positively confirmed

The district court in Düsseldorf has found that the “5G-technology” offered by Kronotex constitutes an infringement of the Megaloc patent and sentenced Kronotex through a judgement publicised on 31st July 2007 (4 b O 266/06). CLASSEN comments “Our patent position is strong and indisputable!” This positive decision for Classen is based on the patent infringement action in which the said manufacturer of laminate flooring raised against its competitor Kronotex on the 17th July 2006 at the district court in Düsseldorf. Kronotex makes use of the so-called “5g-Technology” from Välinge

as licensee. According to the Judge in Düsseldorf the “5g-technology” infringes on the older Megaloc patent from Classen. In addition, the judge had no doubts about the validity of the Megaloc patent. A further patent infringement action against Välinge will take place before the court in Düsseldorf in September (4 a O 265/06)

“The stubbornness from Välinge is unbelievable for us. At the end of the day we had already registered our patent for the Megaloc-system with the German Patent Office two years before Välinge, in August 2001.” In the following year, again a year before Välinge, the registration for an international patent for Megaloc was made with the international patent registration made public on the 27th February 2003 thus creating “prior art” for all later patent applications. All this happened around 10 months before Välinge first brought its 5G system to patent registration in Sweden in December 2003. Furthermore, a further year lies between the publicising of our patent and the international registration from Välinge, so almost two years difference”, says an astonished Board of Directors at CLASSEN.

CLASSEN sees itself as the inventor of the quick installation system in which the panels are joined together on the short profile by simply lowering the panels into place. A short, sharp push down on the profile is then all that is required to lock both panels into place. Time consuming installation or even hammering to connect the short profile, as often found on traditional laminate installation systems, is no longer required with the patented CLASSEN fold-down system. The installation in itself can be carried out without tools. Within Classen, there is a relaxed feeling with regards to the upcoming process against Välinge on the 20th September this year. “As we have seen from past evidence Classen has clearly the oldest rights here. Also, the current Kronotex decision will exert an important influence on the process in September,” claim Classen with a degree of certainty.