On December 29, 2009, the U.S. International Trade Commission instituted an investigation of Certain DC-DC Controllers and Products Containing the Same (Inv. No. 337-TA-698).

The investigation is based on a December 2, 2009 complaint and December 3 and 23, 2009 letters supplementing the complaint filed by Richtek Technology Corp. of Taiwan and Richtek USA, Inc. of San Jose, California (collectively, “Richtek”) alleging violations of Section 337 in the importation into the United States, the sale for importation, and the sale within the United States after importation of certain DC-DC controllers and products containing such controllers which allegedly infringe U.S. Patent Nos. 7,315,190, 6,414,470, and 7,132,717, and by reason of misappropriation of trade secret information relating to Richtek’s DC-DC controllers.  See our December 4 post for more details.

According to the Notice of Investigation, the Commission has identified the following as respondents in this investigation:

• uPI Semiconductor Corp. of Taiwan


• Advanced Micro Devices, Inc. of Sunnyvale, California


• Sapphire Technology Limited of Hong Kong


• Best Data Products Inc. of Chatsworth, California


• XFX Technology, Inc. of Ontario, California

Further, Heidi E. Strain of the Office of Unfair Import Investigations is identified on the Notice of Investigation as the Investigative Attorney assigned to handle this investigation.