Maxeon Solar Technologies has filed a lawsuit against Tongwei Solar in Germany’s Dusseldorf district court for the alleged infringement of its European patent for shingled solar cell technology.
Singapore-based Maxeon Solar Technologies has revealed that it has filed a patent infringement case against China-based Tongwei Solar and its German subsidiary, Tongwei Solar GmbH.
Maxeon said it filed the lawsuit with the Dusseldorf district court in Germany. It claims that Tongwei infringed on its European Patent No. EP3522045 B1 for shingled solar cell panel technology. Maxeon uses the tec in its Performance Line solar modules.
“The intellectual property behind our shingled solar cell technology is the outcome of investments and technical advancements, the resultant Performance Line outperforms conventional panels in efficiency, power, and reliability,” said Maxeon CEO Bill Mulligan. “In September 2020, Maxeon filed a lawsuit against Canadian Solar in Japan, which was subsequently settled in April 2022. With this latest filing against Tongwei Solar, Maxeon is continuing to vigorously enforce its valuable intellectual property rights to prohibit unauthorized use.”
Tongwei did not respond to pv magazine’s request for comment at the time of publication.
The Performance Line PV panel architecture and manufacturing processes were pioneered by Cogenra Solar, a Silicon Valley startup that SunPower acquired in 2015. In the subsequent 2020 spinoff from SunPower, Maxeon retained the intellectual property associated with the solar cell and module technologies, as well as the SunPower brand in the more than 100 markets it serves, according to a company statement.
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