ARRI and Rotolight have announced that they’ve settled their dispute over Rotolight patents and that both sides have withdrawn their legal challenges.
"ARRI has agreed to a settlement with Rotolight, relating to Rotolight’s cinematic special effects “CineSFX" patent portfolio in the US, UK, and Europe,” ARRI and Rotolight said in a joint statement. “ARRI no longer contests the validity of Rotolight’s patents and has withdrawn its Inter Partes Review in the US accordingly. Simultaneously, Rotolight has withdrawn its US District patent court action against ARRI. All ARRI products will continue to be offered as always. ARRI and Rotolight respect intellectual property and value fair competition”.
In a separate statement, Rod Aaron Gammons, CEO of Rotolight added that “Rotolight invests millions each year into research and development in order to bring its customers the latest in lighting technology and innovation. However, such investments can only be made with the knowledge that those investments and the intellectual property, which underpins them will be respected. We are therefore pleased to have reached a settlement with ARRI, and shall continue to take all steps necessary to protect our intellectual property from ongoing infringement. In so doing, this will allow us to continue to invest in bringing industry-first innovations to market. Any other infringing companies should now proactively approach Rotolight directly, to secure a licensing agreement on reasonable commercial terms. ”
Rotolight designs innovative LED lighting products for the cine/broadcast and photographic industries that have been used by leading filmmakers, studios and broadcasters around the globe.
Manufactured in the UK, Rotolight products have pioneered numerous industry-first, patented technologies, such as the first suite of user customizable cinematic lighting effects (CineSFX), and the world’s first electronic diffusion technology (SmartSoft), the company said.
The company also noted that the Rotolight CineSFX and related Magic Eye patent family contains 18 granted patents relating to user-customisable special effects, which have been granted by patent offices in the US, UK, Germany and Europe, the company said.
These patents were developed internally by Rotolight, working in conjunction with Emmy winning Visual FX Veteran Stefan Lange (IMDB), who is listed as a co-inventor of these patents.
In addition to the settlement agreed with ARRI, Rotolight also successfully defended two IPR cases relating to the same patents (IPR2022-00262 and IPR2022-00261) in the USA brought against it by Vitec Production Solutions Inc.
The Patent Trial and Appeal Board found in Rotolight's favor, denied the institution of their InterPartes patent review and re-confirmed the validity of the granted Rotolight CineSFX patents, Rotolight said.
