CONCORD, Mass., March 31 /PRNewswire/ -- Starmet Corporation
(Nasdaq: STMT) today announced that The United States Patent and Trademark
Office has granted, in its entirety, the Company's request to reexamine Brush
Wellman Inc. Patent No. 5,642,773.
The Brush Wellman Patent is the subject of infringement litigation
initiated by Brush Wellman on December 9, 1997, after Starmet refused a
request by Brush Wellman for cross-licensing of Starmet's patented technology,
including the Company's family of patented Beralcast(R) alloys.
Starmet's request cited prior patents indicating that the technology
claimed by the Brush Wellman Patent was fully anticipated by prior work and
that the patent should not have been granted.
In granting the request, the Patent Examiner agreed that each of the
examples of prior art cited by the Company in its request independently raised
substantial new questions of patentability which were not decided in the
previous examination which led to the granting of the Brush Wellman Patent.
The Company has been advised by patent counsel that Brush Wellman's claims
in the infringement litigation are without merit because the Brush Wellman
Patent is invalid due to "prior art" and because of sales by Starmet of
investment cast beryllium aluminum products more than a year before Brush
Wellman applied for its patent.
Starmet has requested a stay of the patent litigation pending the outcome
of the reexamination by the Patent Office.
Starmet Corporation is a diversified metallurgical technology company
based in Concord, Massachusetts.
Note:
Statements contained herein that are not statements of historical fact are
"forward-looking statements." Forward-looking statements include, without
limitation, statements concerning the Company's and its competitors'
technologies and the Company's view that the Brush Wellman patent should be
invalidated and that its right to use its own patented technology will be
fully substantiated.
Such forward-looking statements are based on a number of assumptions and
involve a number of risks and uncertainties, including uncertainties which are
commonly present in any litigation, such as the availability of injunctive
and other equitable relief in the discretion of a court. Accordingly, actual
results could differ materially from those projected in the forward-looking
statements. Additional factors that may cause such differences include, but
are not limited to, those factors described in Exhibit 99 to the Company's
quarterly report on Form 10-Q for the fiscal quarter ended March 31, 1997.
SOURCE Starmet Corporation
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CONTACT:
Frank J. Vumbaco, Vice President, Corporate
Communications of Starmet, 978-369-5410
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