Tech firms cry foul in Taiwain
| Taipei, Taiwan
鈥� A local, slice-of-life story from a Monitor correspondent.
A lawsuit by a little-known Taiwanese high-tech firm against Apple has joined the list of uphill legal cases against Silicon Valley.
Working on computer hardware contracts for 30 years, Apple鈥檚 onetime partner Proview International Holdings alleges 鈥渇raudulent actions鈥� by the computer giant to acquire iPad trademarks. But Proview鈥檚 would be just one case. High-tech firms in Taiwan say they developed numerous firsts that became market successes only after being rebranded in the United States, Japan, or South Korea. Proview鈥檚 claim joins that of Taiwan-based Elan Microelectronics, which sued Apple in 2009 over patents for the touchpad.
In addition, several Taiwanese firms claim to have come up with the 鈥渁ll-in-one鈥� compact desktop computer in 2007 only to find it sold later by Apple and Lenovo, says Helen Chiang of market research firm IDC in Taipei.
Taiwan lags behind overseas peers because its tech firms, facing slimmer profits from contracts, only started branding their own PCs within the past five to 10 years, the Taiwanese government and private analysts say.
鈥淭he problem isn鈥檛 with product functions or technology,鈥� says Hanson Tseng, strategic marketing executive director with the Taiwan External Trade Development Council. 鈥淚t鈥檚 about whether the brand can be advanced.鈥�
