In 2019, LG Chem, a global chemical company based in Korea, acquired next-generation technologies and patents relating to soluble organic light-emitting diodes (OLEDs) from DuPont, a US company.  In 2019, two foreign competitors filed invalidation actions at the Intellectual Property Trial and Appeal Board (the “IPTAB”) against one of these patents pertaining to deuterated compounds (the “Subject Patent”), one of the key technologies acquired by LG Chem.

LG Chem retained Kim & Chang’s Intellectual Property Group (“IP Group”) as its representative in these invalidation actions, and the IP Group successfully defended the Subject Patent at the IPTAB after a three-year-long battle. Specifically, the IP Group showed that the technical idea of the Subject Patent (relating to a significant improvement in the life of blue organic light-emitting diodes without sacrificing other properties through deuterium substitution) was novel and inventive, and the IPTAB ultimately affirmed the validity of the Subject Patent.

Our IP Group was able to prepare an effective defense due to its extensive expertise in the field of OLEDs and its thorough analysis and understanding of prior art and the Subject Patent.  The IP Group was able to present numerous precedents and similar cases to the IPTAB as well as persuasively explain the relevant legal principles to support that the core technical idea of the Subject Patent was neither identical to nor easily derivable from the prior art.  As a result, the patents protecting the critical technology acquired by LG Chem to bolster its industry-leading technological position continue to serve as an important component of LG Chem's future business plans.