US automaker Ford called for a voluntary agreement on LG Energy Solutions and SK Innovation, which are fighting legally over whether electric vehicle battery trade secrets are infringed. Companies that receive batteries from SK, such as Ford and Volkswagen, are expected to disrupt EV production plans according to the results of this lawsuit.
On the 11th (local time), Jim Farley, CEO of Ford, tweeted on the day that “we welcome the decision of the International Trade Commission (ITC) to be supplied with batteries for the electric vehicle F-150.” “The agreement between the two companies is ultimately in the best interests of US manufacturers and workers,” he said.
The battery litigation battle between the two companies began in April 2019 when LG Energy Solutions (then LG Chem) filed a lawsuit against SK Innovation to the ITC and the Delaware District Court for’infringement of trade secrets’. At that time, LG Energy Solution was due to the discovery of specific data that leaked a lot of LG Chem’s core technologies from 2017, when SK Innovation announced that it would intensively foster the rechargeable battery business.
The day before, ITC raised LG’s hand in a lawsuit for the infringement of rechargeable battery trade secrets by LG Energy Solution and SK Innovation. SK Innovation issued an order to ban the import of raw materials and finished products for batteries for 10 years. Ford and Volkswagen, which are supplied with SK’s batteries, have a grace period allowing imports for four and two years, respectively.
In February of last year, ITC made a decision to’early lose’ against SK Innovation in a lawsuit for infringement of the trade secret of rechargeable batteries filed by LG Energy Solutions.
SK Innovation said, “It is fortunate that ITC has put a grace period so that it can supply batteries to Ford and Volkswagen to protect SK Innovation’s customers.” I’ll do my best.”
The ITC has a presidential deliberation period for 60 days after the committee decision. The presidential veto may be exercised during this period. After the deliberation period, the lawsuit is finalized. SK Innovation plans to focus on its impact on public interests, such as that the Georgia plant in the US will play an essential and critical role in the eco-friendly automobile industry that the US government is strongly pursuing, and that it can create thousands of decent jobs. to be.
However, the industry believes that President Biden has always emphasized improvement of unfair trade practices and protection of intellectual property rights, and it is unlikely that he will exercise veto over ITC decisions over disputes over trade secret infringement disputes of foreign companies, not their own. Accordingly, Ford seems to have publicly expressed an opinion that the two companies would conclude the dispute as soon as possible through an agreement in a situation where uncertainty over SK battery imports grew.
LG Energy Solutions pressed SK to actively pursue an agreement over the ITC decision, but SK Innovation maintains that it expects US President Joe Biden’s veto to exercise its veto power, saying that it will correct the ITC results. The key is the amount of settlement money. So far, the difference in the amount suggested by the two companies has been so large.
SK Innovation has actively expanded the battery business, such as deciding to build a battery plant in Georgia in the U.S. in 2018, and the investment decision for the first and second plants has reached about 3 trillion won.
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