Epson follows on Canon’s takedown successes and targets infringing products on the Amazon UK platform.
Canon has been very outspoken about its activity on Amazon and its fight against alleged infringing third-party laser toner cartridges offered on Amazon platforms. Over the last year Canon has successfully removed 1,153 ASINs from Amazon in Germany, Italy, Spain and the United Kingdom offering third-party laser toner cartridges from 141 vendors based on one or more of European Patents. Now Epson is pursuing a similar strategy.
Speaking to ITPRO Adrian Meakin, Owner of The Ink Squid explained how Epson has been using the Amazon Reporting Tool after it has identified alleged infringement of its intellectual property. The article highlights that Amazon does shut down the reseller accounts once it has received these complaints but there does not seem much investigation if the claim is accurate.
Meakin highlights that these tactics do mean small UK companies are losing out. He explained: “We had our Amazon account pack up three weeks ago because of repeated notices from Epson. We’ve lost 40 percent of our turnover, we can’t carry on, so it’s worked. In effect, Epson has found a way to remove all listings without even going to court. They can mass-report listings and they have been demolishing, email by email, sellers all over the country. There are people going out of business left, right and centre.”
ITPRO reports that there is no option for Amazon but take the accounts off its site. It is also not clear how many complaints it needs to trigger the closing of accounts or any details on appeal procedures, although Amazon told ITPRO that resellers are able to appeal.
Neil Sharpley, Intellectual Property Lead for the Federation of Small Businesses told ITPRO: “It comes down to the validity or otherwise of the patents that Epson or Canon are using – essentially what they have done is patent the printer, but also aspects of the cartridge as well.”
The patent Epson is using as the base of the complaints to Amazon is a patent Epson applies to the actual cartridges, it “refers to the contacts between the cartridge and printers”.
The Open Rights Group and The Ink Squid are wary of the patents Epson uses for these claims with Meakin claiming: “The real reason for the patent is to try and stop competitors selling third-party cartridges. They are perfectly happy with people buying the printers, many of whom will do so with the expectation of being able to use compatibles, but then they try and stop alternative products being sold.”
ITPRO concludes that “Epson is doing nothing illegal, but critics claim that awarding patents with such little obvious value highlights how companies abuse the patent system to protect profits.” Amy Shepherd, a Legal and Policy Officer at the Open Rights Group said: “These [compatibles] companies are operating legitimately, and they disagree that the patent is being infringed, partly because they argue that the patent isn’t worth the paper it’s written on. The patent system is slightly broken if this type of patent gets through because it is effectively a patent on a plug.”
To read the full report, click here.
