On February 24, 2011, the U.S. International Trade Commission issued a press release announcing that it voted to institute an investigation of Certain Liquid Crystal Display Devices, Products Containing Same, and Methods for Using the Same (Inv. No. 337-TA-760).

The investigation is based on a January 24, 2011 complaint and February 11 and 14 letters supplementing the complaint filed by Sharp Corporation of Japan alleging violation of Section 337 in the importation into the U.S. and sale of certain liquid crystal display devices and products containing the same that infringe one or more claims of U.S. Patent Nos. 6,879,364, 7,304,626, 7,532,183, 7,283,192, 6,937,300, 7,057,689, and 7,838,881.  See our January 26, 2011 post for more details.

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

• AU Optronics Corp. of Taiwan


• AU Optronics Corporation America of Houston, Texas


• BenQ America Corp. of Irvine, California


• BenQ Corporation of Taiwan


• Haier America Trading LLC of New York, New York


• Haier Group Company of China


• LG Electronics Inc. of Korea


• LG Electronics U.S.A., Inc. of Englewood Cliffs, New Jersey


• SANYO Electric Co., Ltd. of Japan


• SANYO North America Corporation of San Diego, California


• TCL Corporation of China


• TTE Technology, Inc. of Indianapolis, Indiana


• VIZIO, Inc. of Irvine, California

Further, Bryan F. Moore of the Office of Unfair Import Investigations is identified in the Notice of Investigation as the Investigative Attorney assigned to handle this investigation.

Lastly, Chief ALJ Paul J. Luckern issued a notice indicating that Robert K. Rogers, Jr. will be the presiding Administrative Law Judge in this investigation.