Scanning: Honewell, Datalogic swap lawsuits
On the heels of a suit by Datalogic against a Honeywell subsidiary, Honeywell alleges copyright infringement against Datalogic.
By Staff -- Modern Materials Handling, 11/6/2008
Honeywell has filed a lawsuit against bar code scanning company Datalogic, alleging copyright infringement, breach of contract and other infractions. This suit comes on the heels of a suit filed by Datalogic against Metrologic, a subsidiary of Honeywell, for trade secret misappropriation.
The suit against Datalogic was filed October 22 by Honeywell Scanning & Mobility, through its subsidiary Omniplanar, in U.S. District Court in New Jersey. Honeywell’s claims are regarding its SwiftDecoder Software by Omniplanar, and include copyright infringement, violation of Digital Millennium Copyright Act, breach of contract and misappropriation of trade secrets.
Omniplanar is a subsidiary of Metrologic, which was acquired by Honeywell in July 2008.
A release sent out by Honeywell on Wednesday said the violations may include all of Datalogic’s 2D imaging products. Honeywell is seeking monetary damages, injunctive relief and impoundment of the violating software.
Both Datalogic and Honeywell deferred comment, directing any response to their respective press releases.
According to Datalogic’s release, Omniplanar claims that certain Datalogic products made wrongful use of software that had been licensed, beginning in 2000, to Datalogic by Omniplanar. After Omniplanar was acquired by Metrologic, Datalogic transitioned to its independently developed decoding software and terminated the software license it hat had with Omninplanar.
Datalogic denies any breach or wrongful use of Omniplanar’s software and believes the claims are brought in retaliation to lawsuits filed by Datalogic against Metrologic, the release stated. The allegations by Omniplanar come four years after the software termination, and come just a few months after parent company Metrologic was served in August with a lawsuit for trade secret misappropriation by Datalogic.
The suit against Metrologic comes from the actions of an ex-Datalogic employee subsequently employed by a Metrologic affiliate. Metrologic “came to wrongfully possess and use confidential information belonging to Datalogic” relating to classes of scanners sold by Datalogic,” the Datalogic release said.
“Honeywell remains steadfast in its commitment to innovation, and we have no choice but to protect our technology and customers through legal action,” Darius Adamczyk, Honeywell Scanning and Mobility CEO, said.
In other suits between the companies, a two-year-old patent infringement action by Datalogic against Metrologic is pending in Oregon, and patent infringement action brought in Germany by an affiliate of Datalogic against a Metrologic affiliate.
In Modern’s 2008 Top 20 automatic data capture suppliers, Datalogic ranked No. 7 with $578.7 million in revenue in 2007. Hand Held products, now Honeywell, had $300 million.
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