TAIPEI, Taiwan--The Taipei District Court on Tuesday here ruled that executives from Intel Corp. and other parties were not guilty of destroying Via Technologies Inc.'s property, including an alleged move to pop the company's balloons at a trade show in 2001, according to a report from DigiTimes.
The defendants in the case were found not guilty, including Stanley Huang, director of marketing and business management of Intel Asia Pacific; Kelly Wu, country manager of Intel Taiwan; and two employees of Taiwan's MagicMedia and Acer Sertek, now merged into Acer Inc., according to the report.
The ruling follows a long and bitter legal battle between Intel and Via, a competitive supplier of chip sets and other products. In September of 2001, Intel filed a suit against Taipei-based Via, claiming that Via infringed upon Intel's Pentium 4-based chip set patents (see Sept. 7, 2001 story ).
Then, in the same month, Via filed a counter suit against Intel Corp. in the United States and Taiwan, claiming that Intel's Pentium 4 microprocessors and 845 chip set lines infringe upon Via's patents.
Via also initiated litigation against Intel for violations of fair trade laws in Taiwan and the willful destruction of its property by Intel representatives during the Computex trade show in Taipei in 2001. At that time, Intel representatives were alleged to have destroyed balloons and other materials with Via's logo at the event (see Sept. 10, 2001 story ).
Last month, however, Via announced it has gained a favorable ruling against Intel Corp. in England over a bitter PC chip-set patent suit. In the case, the English Court of Appeal overturned a ruling in favor of Via over Intel, thereby bringing the two chip set rivals to court. As part of the ruling, Intel was apparently ordered to pay Via's legal costs, according to the Taipei-based company (see Dec. 22, 2002 story ).
