Federal Court Deadline Looms in MPEG LA's ATSC Royalty Complaint Against Toshiba

Toshiba has until Thursday to file any opposition to MPEG LA's motion to have its breach of contract complaint against Toshiba remanded to the New York State Supreme Court from which Toshiba removed it, said an order signed by U.S. District Judge Jesse Furman in Manhattan. MPEG LA would then have until July 9 to respond to Toshiba's opposition, Furman's order said. In its complaint (see 1506220040), ATSC patent pool administrator MPEG LA alleged Toshiba sold DTV sets for years without paying the proper ATSC royalties. MPEG LA also accused Toshiba of “unjust enrichment,” alleging it “benefited from portraying itself as having a pooled patent license with MPEG LA without properly compensating MPEG LA for this benefit.” Toshiba removed the complaint to federal from state court in late May on “diversity jurisdiction” and other grounds that MPEG LA argued in its motion to remand are “baseless.” According to the MPEG LA motion, “unjust enrichment (and breach of contract for that matter) is most assuredly a state-law claim." In court papers, Toshiba hasn’t addressed the allegations that it failed to pay the ATSC royalties it owes MPEG LA. MPEG LA alleged the payments stopped about five years ago, around when Toshiba closed its Toshiba America Consumer Products CE subsidiary in Wayne, New Jersey, and merged that operation into the Toshiba America Information Systems computing subsidiary in Irvine, California (see 1007080097). Toshiba representatives haven't commented. After years of speculation, Toshiba in late January announced it was pulling the plug on its unprofitable North American TV business. The company said it would cease TV development and sales operations in Irvine and license the business to Taiwan’s Compal Electronics, the original design manufacturer with which Toshiba has had a longstanding supply relationship (see 1501290047).