Cognex files suit against Microscan

Cognex (Natick, MA, USA) has filed a lawsuit alleging that Microscan's (Renton, WA, USA) Mobile Hawk, a handheld product used to read Direct Part Mark (DPM) codes, infringes on one of its patents.

The lawsuit, which was filed in the US District Court for the Southern District of New York, seeks to prohibit Microscan from using what Cognex claims is its own patented technology, and to recover damages resulting from the infringement.

"While we welcome legitimate competition, we will not stand idly by when competitors use our proprietary technology against us in the marketplace. We have a responsibility to all of our stakeholders, particularly to our engineers who devote significant effort to create new technologies, to take meaningful action whenever a competitor infringes any of our patents," says Robert J. Willett, Chief Executive Officer of Cognex.

Microscan claims that the patent infringement lawsuit filed against it by Cognex is without merit.

“Microscan has made Cognex fully aware of its belief that the patent alleged is not infringed by the Mobile Hawk and that the relevant patent claims in any event are invalid. Microscan will be defending its rights to fairly compete with Cognex to the fullest extent available," says Scott Summerville, Microscan's President.

-- Dave Wilson, Senior Editor,Vision Systems Design