Judge Hands Epson $7 Million Judgement Over Counterfeits

Judge Hands Epson $7 Million Judgement Over Counterfeits

26 resellers have lost against OEM Epson which was granted a default judgement against them for selling counterfeit inkjet cartridges on Amazon.

Judge Andre Birotte Jr. (pictured), in a California federal district court, granted Seiko Epson Corporation and Epson America (Epson) a $7 million default judgement in damages and a permanent injunction.

The 26 defendants, in this case, all sold counterfeit Epson products which means they infringed Epson’s intellectual property and trademarks. They included Oleksandr Benedychuk; Wisemine Trading Ltd.; Vasyl Kedyk; Sitrol Intertrading Ltd. A/K/A Kekrodi Intertrading Ltd.; Denis Smotrov; Denis Smotrov LLC; Anton Hashynov; Vladislav Bondarenko; Viktor Boiko; Laszlo Kedik; Andrey Klimenko; Iurii Ganychenko; Andriy Stebliv; Larysa Ponomarenko; Volodymyr Shevchun; Liliia Stakhova; Veleriya Kosolapova; Nina Kozlova; Denis Evseev; Tymur Isaiev; Ihor Kobylinskyi; Vladyslav Pankov; Andrii Pavlov; Roman Kholodov; Anton Kovalkov; and Oleksandr Bobyr.

The case dates back to August 2018, where Epson claimed the counterfeiters were selling “numerous counterfeited models of Epson-branded ink cartridges online.

According to Epson, the company “considers its proprietary advanced core technologies to be among its most important assets because they are what power innovation and sustain our growth as an indispensable company.

“Protecting these core technologies is thus critically important in terms of business strategy and that is why our intellectual property activities are an integral part of business.

“Epson emphasizes proactive intellectual property activities. Rather than reactively use our intellectual property rights to counter against third parties, we proactively position ourselves to respond to potential future intellectual property issues by obtaining and actively using intellectual property rights in anticipation of future business.”

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