Bajaj Auto, TVS Motor Settle All Cases Related To Patent Infringement

Bajaj Auto Ltd. and TVS Motor Company Ltd. have settled a decade-old dispute related to a patent infringement case with the two companies withdrawing several pending proceedings from various courts and fora.

In separate regulatory filings on Thursday, the two companies said they have entered into a settlement agreement to amicably settle the decade-old dispute related to alleged infringement of Bajaj Auto's patent for digital twin-spark plug ignition technology.

The settlement also includes defamation suit against Bajaj Auto filed by TVS Motor and other related proceedings filed against each other, which were pending before the Madras High Court, Bombay High Court, the Intellectual Property Appellate Board, Chennai, and courts in Sri Lanka and Mexico.

"TVS Motor and Bajaj Auto have mutually agreed to withdraw pending proceedings and release each other from all liabilities, claims, demands and actions in respect of the pending proceedings," they said. As part of the settlement, none of them are required to pay any compensation or penalty to the other as part of the said settlement.

In September 2007, Bajaj Auto had accused TVS Motor of infringing its patent on DTS-i (acronym for digital twin spark plug ignition) when the later launched its motorcycle model Flame 125cc that had controlled combustion variable timing intelligent (CC-VTi) technology.

Bajaj Auto had claimed that TVS' CCVTi technology was a copy of its DTS-i technology, which it uses in various products including the Pulsar series of motorcycles. TVS Motor had denied Bajaj Auto's allegations and filed a Rs 250-crore defamation suit against the rival.

On Thursday, Bajaj Auto shares rose 0.79 percent to Rs 3,246.75 apiece while those of TVS Motor fell 2.13 percent to Rs 484.40. The benchmark Sensex gained 0.19 percent to end the day at 40,129.05 points.