Category: VW Settlement

SemaConnect is fighting back against a patent claim lawsuit brought by rival EV charging company, ChargePoint. A lawyer for the Maryland-based SemaConnect, Inc. sent a letter to U. S. District Judge Marvin J. Garbis saying that ChargePoint’s Motion For Emergency Injunctive Relief should be summarily denied. A hearing on the Motion is scheduled in U. S. District Court in Baltimore on Friday, December 22, 2017.

In correspondence to the Judge, SemaConnect’s representative stated, “At its core, ChargePoint’s Motion is an obvious attempt to restrain free and fair competition by asserting baseless patent infringement claims against SemaConnect instead of competing fairly in the market.”

SemaConnect & ChargePoint Competed for Electrify America Contract

SemaConnect argued that granting the injunctive relief would harm the public’s interest because it would delay the deployment of hundreds of EV charging stations around the country that would help reduce carbon emissions. In the document, SemaConnect explained that in March 2017, Electrify America invited suppliers of EV charging stations to submit a request for proposal (RFP) for a contract to provide “community charging stations” to be financed under the $2 billion ZEV Investment Plan mandated by a settlement with Volkswagon. Companies including SemaConnect and ChargePoint, submitted RFPs for the contract. Electrify America ultimately chose three companies: SemaConnect, Greenlots, and EVConnect. However, ChargePoint was not selected and did not receive any funding.
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PlugInSites has obtained a copy of court documents that were filed in the ChargePoint, Inc. v SemaConnect, Inc. civil action in which ChargePoint alleges that SemaConnect is infringing on a number of patents related to EV charging networks.

ChargePoint is asking for a temporary restraining order and preliminary injunction barring SemaConnect from using the patents in dispute.

The lawsuit was filed by ChargePoint on Friday, December 15, 2017. Today, December 18, there are news reports that the Electrify America unit of Volkswagen plans to install 2,800 electric vehicle charging stations in U.S. cities by June 2019.

Electrify America is investing $2 billion over the next 10 years in the U.S. for Zero Emission Vehicle (ZEV) infrastructure and education as part of a settlement reached in the VW diesel emissions case. The reports say that Electrify America has selected SemaConnect as well as EV Connect and Greenlots to install those charging stations.

In the Plaintiff’s Memorandum in Support of Emergency Injunctive Relief, ChargePoint stated:

SemaConnect is in the process of entering into contracts, to be completed within the next 90 days, to deploy at least $16 million in competing EV charging stations to customers free of charge, and provide services related to those stations free of charge for the next eight years. ChargePoint believes that the size of that free offer is equal to more than half of the total available market for those charging stations during the offer period. Participants in the offer will receive free charging stations, as well as free network services and support for a period of 8 years. SemaConnect is able to do this because Volkswagen Group of America (through its subsidiary, Electrify America) is subsidizing SemaConnect’s offerings as part of Volkswagen’s commitment to spend $2 billion on zero-emission vehicle (“ZEV”) infrastructure and technology under settlement terms Volkswagen agreed to in the aftermath of an emissions-rigging scandal in 2015. Importantly, SemaConnect’s EV charging systems are attractive to Electrify America because of the functionalities they provide. Unfortunately, many of those functionalities infringe the Asserted Patents.

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Electric Vehicle charging equipment and service provider, ChargePoint of Campbell, California, has filed a patent infringement lawsuit against Maryland-based SemaConnect.

The complaint was filed in the District of Maryland Court on Friday, December 15, 2017. ChargePoint is seeking injunctive relief and monetary damages and has requested a jury trial.

The lawsuit alleges infringement of four patents held by ChargePoint in the area of networked electric vehicle charging.

In a press release, the company said, “ChargePoint invented networked EV charging and holds the patents related to the technology. A hallmark of the company’s technology portfolio, networked charging is a significant piece of ChargePoint’s offering and a critical ingredient to its business.”

ChargePoint claims to be the largest EV charging network in the world, reporting that they have over 43,000 independently owned charging spots.