DJI Won the Patent Battle with Synergy Drone

In March 2017, Synergy Drone sued DJI (DJ-Innovations) in the United States and accused DJI of infringing the patent rights of its five patents. The five patents involved were US8380368 and its patent families. The involved patents are about a radio controlled aircraft and the method for use with the radio controlled aircraft. In the patents, no matter how the aircraft flies, it is oriented by the direction of the radio control. This feature has been widely used in the field of drones, especially in multi-rotor drones, which is a common feature in the field of drones. In the five patents involved in the lawsuits, four of them were traded many times.

After being accused, in addition to responding to the District Court, DJI also proposed IPRs (Inter Partes Review) for the five involved patents in the US Patent Trail and Appeal Board on November 22, 2017. IPR is a trail process for challenging the granted patents. According to the data released by the USPTO, the IPR filing rate was 60%-65% between 2017 and 2018, but the five IPRs proposed by DJI were all filed. Recently, 142 claims of the involved five patents were invalidated. DJI achieved a staged victory in this patent battle.

When talk about drones, many people’s impressions about drones remain in sophisticated military products. At that time, the software and hardware theory and practical technology of drone were completely sophisticated, which made many companies in the civilian field discouraged. With the open source of the flight control core code and the development of hardware industry chains such as sensors, processors and batteries, many companies have begun to get involved in the field of drones. DJI is undoubtedly the leader in the consumer and commercial drone field. According to statistics, DJI has a global market share of about 72% in the consumer drone market, and it also has a high market share in the United States. It is no wonder that many competitors and even NPEs pointed their finger at DJI. In these high-tech fields, patents have always been a good weapon against opponents. In addition to Synergy Drone mentioned in the article, DJI has encountered other patent disputes in the US. On September 4, 2018, the US Department of Commerce website showed that the US Autel Robotics filed an application with the US International Trade Commission (ITC), accusing DJI’s products of infringing its patent rights. Autel Robotics requested the United States to initiate 337 investigations and issue the limited exclusion order and restraining order. In February 2019, DJI was once again targeted by the NPE. A US technology company called Dareltech sued DJI in the United State for patent infringing. Dareltech had previously accused Xiaomi Tech in the United States.

In just over two years, DJI has encountered patent disputes in the US market many times, and the patent battle with Synergy Drone has undoubtedly boosted the confidence of DJI in patent warfare. At the end of May and June 2019, after several rounds of replies and amendments to the claims, PTAB successively announced that all five patents involved were invalid, including 66 claims that were amended during the invalidation process. The victory of this patent invalidation has dealt a heavy blow to Synergy Drone. At the same time, it also demonstrates the ability of DJI to flexibly handle patent disputes when it comes to patent infringement lawsuits.

DJI has always attached great importance to the accumulation of intellectual property rights. In the list of top 500 Chinese company in patent issued in 2019, DJI has ranked the fourth. Although the number of patents is less than the other top companies, DJI pays great attention to the global intellectual property layout. DJI attaches great importance to the continuous, all-round and globalization protection of innovation achievements. This is also related to the market characteristics of DJI. Today, in the consumer market, DJI is in a leading position in the global market. As a leader in this field, DJI must protect its leading technological achievements and prevent others from infringing by laying out patents globally.

The performance of DJI in the patent battle with Synergy Drone has also set an example for many domestic companies that want to expand their business overseas. When faced with patent battles from competitors or even NPEs, the enterprises should continuously accumulate experience and take positive actions to response. At the same time, they must strengthen their ability in independent innovation. When appropriate, they should take the patent invalidation process or even counterclaims to counterattack. In addition, enterprises need to conduct FTO search of the related products in advance and they can pay attention to competitors’ patents in real time before the product is launched to the market.