Rivals Hijacked Trucks to Steal Technology ?

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SAN FRANCISCO (CN) – Well the latest rumour is Hewlett Packard claims Chinese and Taiwanese competitors stole patented printer cartridge components from HP's factory in Singapore and copied them to sell made-to-order counterfeit HP inkjet cartridges on Amazon.com. "Trucks carrying HP parts were apparently hijacked while en route from the manufacturing facility in Singapore to the assembly plant in Malaysia ... in direct response to the heightened security measures that had been implemented in HP production facilities," HP says.
     After stealing the technology, Hewlett Packard claims, Microjet Technology (of Taiwan) Mipo Technology (of Hong Kong and mainland China), and their U.S. affiliates, including SinoTime Technologies (of Florida) sold more than 300,000 of the inkjet cartridges in the United States. The defendants have the capability to make nearly 10 million counterfeit cartridges a year in Asia, Hewlett Packard says.
     The federal filing is the latest in a long line of complaints that China is making up its technology gap with the United States through industrial espionage, theft, and wholesale patent infringement.
     MicroJet "sells generic and/or made-to-order infringing ink cartridges to other companies, including defendants Mipo and PTC [PTC Holdings Ltd., of Hong Kong]," and sells them itself as well, Hewlett Packard says. HP claims the defendants violated six patents after stealing the HP components.
     Hewlett Packard says it discovered the scheme after seeing color ink cartridges for sale on Amazon.com and Craigslist, advertised as "HP compatible."
     HP bought some of the cartridges from Amazon.com, then used HP's internal tracking database to cross-reference ID numbers on components, and found that the cartridges had "a genuine HP printhead and a non-HP cartridge body that closely resembled a genuine HP cartridge body."
     And it found that the printheads came from HP lots from Malaysia that had never been assembled by HP - "i.e., were identified as production gaps." All of these stolen items "were packaged in a 'Mipo' labeled box and were individually wrapped in a clear plastic interior packaging that is clearly consistent with the standard packaging for products manufactured by defendant Microjet," according to the complaint.
HP demands an injunction and damages for patent infringement, unfair competition and conversion.

New Printer Models Released for the holiday season

Yup, true to form both Epson and Canon have released new printer models for the holiday season. Both manufacturers unfortunately, are attempting to keep ahead of the third party inkjet cartridge marketplace, and are offering printers using ink only available from Canon or Epson.

I.E. There are no third party inks yet available for these printers.

The easiest way to verify if the printer your are looking at is compatible with third party products is to check on a Third Party manufacturers web site.

Third Party Compatible Canon Printers

Third Party Compatible Epson Printers

Although many of the new printers released are sporting new options like double sided printing, and CD printing you must be very careful to ensure that you can purchase third party Inkjet Cartridge ink for these printers if you are to be able to be able to use these printers at a reasonable cost.

We are in constant contact with most Third Party ink manufacturers (The Reputable ones) and will be the first to let you know when, or if compatible products will be brought to the market for newer models being released.

Like everything else in life, the good thing are worth waiting for..