Two of the world's leading suppliers of solar panels, LONGi Green Energy Technology of China and Hanwha Solutions Corporation of South Korea have put an end to their patent infringement war, on since 2019, with patent cross-licensing arrangement.
In a statement issued by LONGi, the Chinese company the licensing agreement allows both the parties to legally use the relevant patented technology globally. It will not have any impact on the company's operations. It will continue to provide diversified products and services to customers globally.
Under the arrangement reached out-of-court, both the companies have committed to cancel all litigation and patent invalidation proceedings globally. Having withdrawn their lawsuit, both the companies do not have any patent disputes anywhere in the world, according to LONGi.
For a quick background, the patent infringement lawsuit was filed by Hanwha against LONGi, JinkoSolar and REC Group in 2019 in the US, Germany and Australia wherein it claimed the trio was using the company's patented passivation technology (see USITC To Investigate Hanwha's Claims).