Honeywell sues over LCD patent, US 5,280,371

Honeywell announced on October 6, 2004 that it had filed a patent infringement suit in the federal district court of Delaware over US 5,280,371 against a number of companies, including Apple, Argus a.k.a. Hartford Computer Group Inc., Audiovox Corp., Casio Computer Co. Ltd., Casio Inc., Concord Cameras, Dell Inc., Eastman Kodak Co., Fuji Photo Film Co. Ltd., Fuji Photo Film U.S.A. Inc., Fujitsu Ltd., Fujitsu America Inc., Fujitsu Computer Products of America Inc., Kyocera Wireless Corp., Matsushita Electrical Industrial Co., Matsushita Electrical Corp. of America, Navman NZ Ltd., Navman U.S.A. Inc., Nikon Corp., Nikon Inc., Nokia Corp., Nokia Americas, Olympus Corp., Olympus America Inc., Pentax Corp., Pentax U.S.A. Inc., Sanyo Electric Co. Ltd., Sanyo North America, Sony Corp., Sony Corp. of America, Sony Ericsson Mobile Communications AB, Sony Ericsson Mobile Communications (USA) Inc., Toshiba Corp. and Toshiba America Inc.

Honeywell described its technology as enabling "a display to produce a brighter image (making the screen easier to see) without requiring additional power while helping to reduce the appearance of an undesirable interference pattern called the 'Moire effect' on the screen." Honeywell originally developed the technology for the aerospace industry, for use with LCD-based displays in airplane cockpits.