Innoscience asks USPTO to rule Infineon GaN patent invalid

Business news | June 24, 2024

By Peter Clarke

GaN power chip maker Innoscience, has asked the US Patent and Trademark to review of the validity of a patent owned by Infineon Technologies Austria AG.

Infineon’s US. Patent No. 9,899,481 is at the heart of law suits brought against Innoscience by Infineon in both the US and Europe (see Infineon sues Innoscience over US GaN patents – update and China’s Innoscience responds to Infineon’s European GaN lawsuits).

Innoscience Technology Co. Ltd. (Zhuhai, China), has previously questioned the validity of the patent at the heart of Infineon’s allegations, asserting that the patent does not cover fundamental aspects of GaN power semiconductors but rather is related to the packaging of GaN transistors. Innoscience has now formally petitioned the USPTO to conduct an ‘inter partes’ review of the patent to determine its validity and cancel all claims within the ‘481 patent.

In a statement Innoscience claims in its petition against the Infineon ‘481 patent that its claims can all be struck down on evidence of prior art or obviousness. Innoscience said it plans to pursue the invalidity of three asserted German patents belonging to Infineon.

Innoscience stated that the lawsuits in the US and Europe only concern a small fraction of its GaN transistors and that the lawsuits have no effect on its freedom to make, sell, or import products for customers, until there is an adjudication.

Innoscience, founded in December 2015, claims to be the world’s largest manufacturer of GaN-on-Si power transistors. The company opened its first 200mm wafer fab for GaN-on-Si production in Zhuhai in November 2017 and second wafer fab in Suzhou in September 2020. Innoscience said its has filed more than 800 patent applications globally and has an R&D team of more than 500 engineers.