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Technology Stocks : Energy Conversion Devices -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Futurist who wrote (2301)	9/16/1998 8:38:00 PM
From: Retiarius	Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 8393

the print on this one is not so fine... an american honda alternative fuels program spokesperson (connie walton?) just called to clarify/amplify "the motor trend misprint", saying that they contemplate no changes in the use of panasonic batteries for the 1999 model year honda ev+. as oldtimers know, panasonic is a sub of matsushita, who currently accrues no EV battery royalties for ECD. part of the argument is that matsushita has a license for "consumer batteries" from ECD [for which they do pay fees at some low rate (1/2%?)], but that they want the same rate for the prismatic items >30mAh. for the toyota prius, panasonic apparently has chosen to workaround the mischmetal-related lawsuit "settlement" by stringing together a plethora of tiny "consumer" batteries to make a hybrid EV pack! my take on opening up the royalty can of worms -- challenge ECD to periodically list all products X for which they receive royalites. then we can assume product Y not on the list is either exempt from ECD patents or is not worth recovery, or is too new to judge. right now ECD misleadingly chooses to answer all questions attempting to match product Y with a revenue stream by intoning that product Y is made by company Z which is an ECD licensee. but as we have seen more than once, many large-volume (actual or potential) products are distributed by ECD licensees who don't really use the manufacturing license. if they do manufacture, it's often something using the almighty "ECD technology" (phase change, NiMH, whatever) but (in the rogue companies' belief, because that's all it takes short of a courtroom) only the subset not covered by the unexpired patents explicitly listed in the license agreement. e.g. phase change. sony & ecd jointly put out a press release talking about an extended license. you think, oh great, all sony phase change products will mean $$ to ENER shareholders. reality: sony resells unlicensed ricoh media. when ecd whines "but wait, you know that this stuff is phase change, and we have a royalty-bearing license", they might send out an exec to say "all we know is that thing X we buy from company Z is a round, 120 cm disk, and has some amorphous-looking metal sandwiched in -- why don't you ask them if this stuff violates your patents?" and so it goes... p.s. is ricoh contemplating making unlicensed DVD-sized erasables? are their tustin, california assembly lines starting up this month, per press release? will power-tool NiCad battery drop-in replacement be "Ovonic NiMH" or non-Ovonic NiMH? inquiring minds (and pension funds) want to know!