Image credit: 12295263 (Pixabay)
The lawsuit between the companies producing synthetic diamonds is subject to further consideration, since there are sufficient grounds for litigation regarding the methods of production and processing of stones. This decision was made by an American judge.
According to jewellermagazine.com, in January this year, the American company WD Lab Grown Diamonds, along with the research organization The Carnegie Institute of Washington, filed a lawsuit against six other companies that grow diamonds in the laboratory.
It was alleged that these companies infringed two patents. One of them was associated with the production of diamonds by the chemical vapour deposition (CVD), the other a type of high-pressure, high-temperature (HPHT) post-growth treatment. Singaporean IIa Technologies and its subsidiary Pure Grown Diamonds, as well as the American Fenix Diamonds, which produces laboratory-grown diamonds for Australian jewelry company Michael Hill International, and its Indian subsidiary Mahendra Brothers, were named as defendants.
The agency says that in a judgement handed down last month, Judge Jed Rakoff ruled that the case could proceed. According to him, it was “at least plausible” that the companies had infringed the patents “based on the allegations that defendants’ diamonds could not be of the type and quality claimed unless produced through infringing methods”.
In February, the Singapore High Court ruled that IIA Technologies infringed a patent held by De Beers Element Six, also a producer of chemical vapor deposition stones. Element Six began litigation against IIA Technologies in 2016.
Alex Shishlo, Editor of the Rough&Polished European Bureau
