Lee International

A Non-Practicing Entity (NPE) that acquired LG's Smartphone related patents filed a lawsuit against Samsung Electronics.  Some predict such attack by "Patent Trolls" would be more frequent as LG terminated its smartphone business and the relevant patents are released in the market.

According to the industry, Ireland-based Scramoge Technology (Scramoge) filed a patent infringement lawsuit against Samsung and Samsung Electronics America (“Samsung”) at Texas Southern District Court in April, 2021. 

Scramoge filed the patent infringement lawsuit based on three patents related to smartphone wireless charging technology purchased from LG Innotek, claiming that a total of 28 Samsung's smartphone models including Galaxy S21 series, Galaxy Z Fold and Galaxy Z Fold2 5G released between 2015 and 2021 infringe the patents.  Scramoge also filed a claim for damages by asserting that Samsung Electronics caused damages by manufacturing and distributing products that directly infringed its patents in the United States.

Scramoge, an NPE, is also known as a "patent troll" and it is infamous for acquiring patents from companies around the world and then filing lawsuits against other companies to earn royalties. 

"Atlantic IP" is the parent company of Scramoge and is also a famous NPE.  In addition to Scramoge, Atlantic IP has subsidiary global Patent Trolls including "Solas OLED" and "Neodron," which had patent infringement lawsuits against Samsung for the OLED Display technology worth 60 million dollars.

Scramoge recently acquired more than 100 U.S. patents from LG Innotek, a subsidiary of LG Electronics, when LG Electronics announced their plan to terminate the smartphone business.  LG Innotek had been pushing for sales since terminating the smartphone business in 2019.  Scramoge purchased 95 patents and 28 pending patent applications related to the wireless charging technology from LG Innotek, and it is expected that similar lawsuits may be also filed in the future.

Even after terminating the smartphone business, LG Electronics plans to internalize intellectual property (IP) assets, such as the essential mobile patents and the source technology, to be used for the electric vehicles (automobile electric devices) and smart home appliances.  However, the non-essential mobile patents will likely be liquidated.  

Furthermore, LG Innotek recently stopped production and sales of the light emitting diodes (LEDs) and decided to dispose of the remaining facilities and patents except for automotive LEDs such as automotive lighting modules.  If LG Innotek's patents were to be sold to NPEs, LED related patents war may occur.