Wednesday, May 29, 2024 Vicor Corporation announced that the Patent Trial and Appeal Board (PTAB) of the United States Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO) has declined to initiate Inter Partes Review (IPR) of all patents Vicor asserted in its complaint against Delta Electronics (Delta) and its customers at the International Trade Commission (ITC). On July 13, 2023, Vicor filed a complaint at the ITC against Delta for infringing three of its patents: U.S.
Patent Nos. 9,166,481, 9,516,761, and 10,199,950. The complaint triggered an ITC investigation on August 17, 2023, into power converter modules used in various high-tech applications, including data centers and AI systems.
Vicor’s ITC complaint seeks a limited exclusion and cease-and-desist orders to prevent the importation of infringing power converter modules and computing systems into the U.S. An evidentiary hearing took place from April 29 to May 3, 2024, with a decision pending.
Delta attempted to challenge the validity of these patents through IPR petitions filed for the ‘950 patent on November 2, 2023, the ‘481 patent on November 13, 2023, and the ‘761 patent on November 22, 2023. However, on May 17, 2024, and May 24, 2024, the PTAB concluded that Delta was unlikely to succeed in its challenges, thus denying the institution of all three IPRs. The patents in question cover innovative technologies in power conversion, including digital control of switching resonant power converters (‘481 patent), non-isolated, .