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Solomon Completes Infringement Case Against Toyota

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Old 11-10-06, 01:43 AM
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mavericck
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Default Solomon Completes Infringement Case Against Toyota

I had no idea that Toyota might have stolen this technology....this means that Toyota may not be able to sell hybrids in the U.S. anymore.

TARPON SPRINGS, Fla., Nov. 6, 2006 (PRIMEZONE) -- Solomon Technologies, Inc. (OTCBB:SOLM) announced today that it has completed the trial portion of its patent infringement case against Toyota Motor Corporation (NYSE:TM) and certain of its affiliates for infringement of Solomon's Electric Wheel(tm) technology patent. Solomon has alleged that the Hybrid Synergy Drive(r) system installed in vehicles manufactured and imported by Toyota, such as the Prius, Highlander Hybrid, Camry Hybrid and the Lexus RX400h, infringe Solomon's U.S. Patent No. 5,067,932.

Solomon President Peter W. DeVecchis, Jr. said, "Solomon and its litigation team have completed the trial portion of its infringement action before the International Trade Commission in Washington, DC. Although litigation has never been our first choice to protect our intellectual property rights, I believe we presented a very strong case to the Administrative Law Judge and remain very confident in our position. There will be considerable post trial submissions in the form of written legal briefs and possibly follow-on questions from the court."

He continued, "With this portion of the effort nearly behind us, we will be intensifying our focus on expanding the licensing efforts of our patented technology as recently evidenced by our license with Hobie Cat, continuing the integration of the newly acquired Technipower business and targeting other acquisition opportunities. In addition, we expect shortly to announce results for the third quarter of 2006."

As previously announced, Mintz, Levin, Cohn, Ferris, Glovsky and Popeo, P.C. represents Solomon in its pending action against Toyota. Solomon brought suit against Toyota Motor Corporation, Toyota Motor Sales U.S.A. Inc. and Toyota Motor Manufacturing North America in the United States District Court for the Middle District of Florida, Tampa Division, on September 12, 2005, claiming infringement of Solomon's U.S. Patent Number 5,067,932, primarily relating to Toyota's use of the Hybrid Synergy Drive technology in its Prius and Highlander Hybrid vehicles. On January 11, 2006, Solomon filed an additional complaint against Toyota with the ITC seeking to exclude importation of the infringing technology. The action against Toyota and its affiliates in the United States District Court for the Middle District of Florida, Tampa Division, has been stayed pending resolution of the ITC action.

The ITC Administrative Law Judge is expected to issue his initial determination on or before January 18, 2007. If Solomon is successful in its ITC action, Toyota could be prohibited from importing into the United States any vehicle that utilizes the infringing combination motor and transmission systems including the Prius and Highlander models, the Camry Hybrid, the prodigy of the best selling mid-size car in the U.S. market, and the Lexus RX400h.
Information about Solomon Technologies, Inc.:

Solomon Technologies, Inc. develops, licenses, manufactures and sells electric power drive systems, including those incorporating hybrid and regenerative technologies incorporating Solomon's patented Electric Wheel(tm) and Electric Transaxle(tm), for marine, commercial, automotive, hybrid and all electric vehicle applications.

Forward Looking Statements: This press release contains forward-looking statements within the meaning of the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995. The statements regarding Solomon Technologies, Inc. in this release that are not historical in nature, particularly those that utilize the terminology such as "may," "will," "should," "likely," "expects," "anticipates," "estimates," "believes," or "plans," or comparable terminology, are forward-looking statements based on current expectations about future events, which management has derived from the information currently available to it. It is possible that the assumptions made by management for purposes of such statements may not materialize. Actual results may differ materially from those projected or implied in any forward-looking statements. Important factors known to management that could cause forward-looking statements to turn out to be incorrect are identified and discussed from time to time in the company's filings with the Securities and Exchange Commission. The forward-looking statements contained in this release speak only as of the date hereof, and the company undertakes no obligation to correct or update any forward-looking statements, whether as a result of new information, future events or otherwise.



CONTACT: Solomon Technologies, Inc.
Peter DeVecchis
727-934-8778
www.solomontechnologies.com

Crescent Communications
David Long
203-226-5527
www.crescentir.com
Provider ID: 00108168 -0- Nov/06/2006 14:53 GMT

Last Updated: November 6, 2006 09:53 EST
http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?p...d=a091enDg1BSM
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Old 11-10-06, 06:00 AM
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Toyota will end up having to buy the patent from Solomon for an obscene amount of money, just to save face, and to keep producing their hybrid cars.

If Toyota did infringe on their design, I hope Solomon gets the semi truck load of cash they have coming to them.
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Old 11-10-06, 03:04 PM
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Wow, I had no idea about this case. I'm kind of hesitant to believe it, but in the past Toyota has stolen intellectual property and technology from Ferrari in F1 and has had a judgment against them, so who knows. We are just going to have to wait and see. Honestly, I'll probably not follow this case much until a verdict comes out.
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Old 11-10-06, 03:44 PM
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Originally Posted by ff_
Toyota will end up having to buy the patent from Solomon for an obscene amount of money, just to save face, and to keep producing their hybrid cars.

If Toyota did infringe on their design, I hope Solomon gets the semi truck load of cash they have coming to them.
lol.. this has been in works for past 2-3 years... they first sued Toyota in Germany, I am not sure what happened with that.

The fact that Toyota went to trial with this, means that either their claim or patent is bogus, because Toyota would have paid settlement if they thought they should have.
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Old 11-10-06, 03:46 PM
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Originally Posted by CK6Speed
Wow, I had no idea about this case. I'm kind of hesitant to believe it, but in the past Toyota has stolen intellectual property and technology from Ferrari in F1 and has had a judgment against them, so who knows. We are just going to have to wait and see. Honestly, I'll probably not follow this case much until a verdict comes out.
thats not true at all. People who had worked for Ferrari, before they joined Toyota, have been on trial for using software they stole from Ferrari. German court never accused Toyota F1 of any wrongdoings...

Then again, since Toyota created their own team, all of their engineers came from other teams - gotta understand that they didnt buy other outfits like BMW or Honda did.
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Old 11-10-06, 06:08 PM
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I don't always agree with spwolf, but I think he has a point. Toyota wouldn't be fighting this if it were not a frivolous claim.

Another point that no one has brought up: Where would Ford fit into this? They use a lot of Toyota-derived hybrid technology in the Ford Escape and Mercury Mariner hybrids. Any hybrid-related case against Toyota could theoretically affect Ford as well....or Ford-owned Mazda when the Tribute Hybrid is released.
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Old 11-10-06, 06:18 PM
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Originally Posted by mmarshall
I don't always agree with spwolf, but I think he has a point. Toyota wouldn't be fighting this if it were not a frivolous claim.

Another point that no one has brought up: Where would Ford fit into this? They use a lot of Toyota-derived hybrid technology in the Ford Escape and Mercury Mariner hybrids. Any hybrid-related case against Toyota could theoretically affect Ford as well....or Ford-owned Mazda when the Tribute Hybrid is released.
Why doesn't Ford just buy Mazda outright?
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Old 11-10-06, 08:51 PM
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Originally Posted by Kepeli
Why doesn't Ford just buy Mazda outright?
Simple. The cash isn't there right now.....and they already own part of Mazda. It would also require a vote by the Mazda board of directors and shareholders.

Back to the original point, though....wonder how this suit could affect Ford?
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Old 11-12-06, 05:39 PM
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Solomon took 15 years before deciding to expand their patents? right. They were just waiting for Toyota to make it popular so that they can cash in. Is there not a rule where you can file for a patent but there's x years or something such that if you didn't bother to market it, you can't sue someone else if they invented it and sold it?
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Old 11-12-06, 06:43 PM
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Originally Posted by Nextourer
Solomon took 15 years before deciding to expand their patents? right. They were just waiting for Toyota to make it popular so that they can cash in. Is there not a rule where you can file for a patent but there's x years or something such that if you didn't bother to market it, you can't sue someone else if they invented it and sold it?
You own a Prius....

Yoy can understand why I am amused right now right?
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Old 11-12-06, 08:23 PM
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Toyota Japan should send some Samurai's too take care of the CEO of Soloman and their families... muhahahah.
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Old 11-12-06, 11:27 PM
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Originally Posted by JessePS
Toyota Japan should send some Samurai's too take care of the CEO of Soloman and their families... muhahahah.
You would want ninjas than not samurai. Samurai were noble warriors not assassins.

The Ford ones I don't think will be affected as much as they do not have straight out copies of Toyota's Synergy.

I don't think it's going to go anywhere anyway, Toyota has improved on the Synergy drive so much since the the first gen Prius that I don't think they have a case.
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Old 11-13-06, 12:56 AM
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Originally Posted by spwolf
thats not true at all. People who had worked for Ferrari, before they joined Toyota, have been on trial for using software they stole from Ferrari. German court never accused Toyota F1 of any wrongdoings...

Then again, since Toyota created their own team, all of their engineers came from other teams - gotta understand that they didnt buy other outfits like BMW or Honda did.
Legal mumbo jumbo aside, the fact that Toyota used Ferrari software no matter if it was stolen by ex Ferrari employee's that now work for Toyota and admitted in court that they had used the Ferrari software to develope their own is true. Toyota admitted it and refused to return the software with an excuse that they had too much of their own software embedded within the Ferrari software that it would give Ferrari too much of Toyota's information is also fact.

I already stated I find Soloman's claims a little hard to believe, but Toyota isn't exaclty a saint when it comes to cheating in motorsports. Sure, everyone does it, but Toyota has two big black marks against them. One in F1 and the other in WRC.

Also, that is a cheap shot against Honda for taking over BAR. If you knew the Honda/BAR situation back in 2002 you wouldn't really be saying that Honda simply bought a team. It wasn't as simple as that. Everyone knew BAR was Honda. Honda has a much better F1 history including many constructors championships than Toyota does.

Last edited by CK6Speed; 11-13-06 at 01:00 AM.
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Old 11-14-06, 07:53 AM
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Originally Posted by CK6Speed
Legal mumbo jumbo aside, the fact that Toyota used Ferrari software no matter if it was stolen by ex Ferrari employee's that now work for Toyota and admitted in court that they had used the Ferrari software to develope their own is true. Toyota admitted it and refused to return the software with an excuse that they had too much of their own software embedded within the Ferrari software that it would give Ferrari too much of Toyota's information is also fact.

I already stated I find Soloman's claims a little hard to believe, but Toyota isn't exaclty a saint when it comes to cheating in motorsports. Sure, everyone does it, but Toyota has two big black marks against them. One in F1 and the other in WRC.

Also, that is a cheap shot against Honda for taking over BAR. If you knew the Honda/BAR situation back in 2002 you wouldn't really be saying that Honda simply bought a team. It wasn't as simple as that. Everyone knew BAR was Honda. Honda has a much better F1 history including many constructors championships than Toyota does.
What is so cheap shot about it? Honda bought F1 team... End of the fact.

Toyota decided to create their whole team from scratch so they can LEARN the technology, not just buy it outright.

If Toyota did something wrong, then German court would have accused them of wrong doing and would have made them return the software, wouldnt it, not to mention damages? Or do you think that German court wants to protect TOYOTA? :-).

In motorsports, you try to do something better than others, there are always claims of cheating... and didnt Honda got banned from races and got points taken away by FIA last year due to cheating? How about Renault's constant walk on the line, or BMW's? Both had technologies specifically banned because they were not within the specs.

I dont see Toyota stock going down over Solomon's claims either, which means analysts dont belive it is an threat.

This has been going on for at least 3 last years, it is not something that just came out.
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Old 11-14-06, 09:09 AM
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Originally Posted by mmarshall
Back to the original point, though....wonder how this suit could affect Ford?
It wouldn't. Ford is a consumer in this scenario, and the worst case scenario for them would be that they would have to buy the same product from a different "source," be it a rebranded Toyota/Solomon or the same old, same old. ff_ is absolutely right - Toyota if found guilty, would just pony up and pay a licensing fee and keep producing cars while Solomon backs the dump truck up to carry all their cash to the bank.
Originally Posted by mmarshall
Toyota wouldn't be fighting this if it were not a frivolous claim...
This happens all the time, especially in corporate and contract law. I'll give a common example: Have you ever pled 'not guilty' to a speeding ticket just so you can get a trial date in hopes that the cop doesn't show up? Same concept. Unless the two companies can reach a settlement, then a trial case it is...
Originally Posted by Nextourer
Solomon took 15 years before deciding to expand their patents? right. They were just waiting for Toyota to make it popular so that they can cash in. Is there not a rule where you can file for a patent but there's x years or something such that if you didn't bother to market it, you can't sue someone else if they invented it and sold it?
Nope - that's the whole idea of patenting an invention. Just because you don't have the capital to produce and market your invention doesn't mean you should lose the idea to someone else who does. Since this patent was filed on 11/28/1990, it falls under the "best of both worlds" clause of patent duration: if the application was filed by June 7, 1995 and issued after June 7, 1978, the term is the later of 17 years from issuance or 20 years from filing. Whew... For those that are interested, you can click here to view the patent granted to Solomon for their invention.

Javier

Last edited by javyLSU; 11-14-06 at 09:22 AM.
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