Canon Delays SED TVs

Canon has pushed back the launch of their first SED flat panels TVs, citing production costs and fallout from its lawsuit with Nano-Proprietary.

Electronics giant Canon has announced they are delaying the launch of their next-generation flat-panel SED televisions, citing the long patent licensing dispute with Nano-Proprietary over key SED technology, and saying they need time to develop production technology which will bring the manufacturing costs of SED panels low enough to make the systems commercially viable. Canon says it will offer a new launch schedule for SED televisions “at a future date.”

Canon had previously announced it played to introduce SED televisions in Japan during the fourth quarter of 2007, and the company had been building $1.5 billion factory in Japan to manufacture the technology. Canon’s delay calls into question the commercial viability of the SED technology in the mass market, particularly as prices drop for LCD televisions, and technology enhancements continue to improve response times and image quality in LCD panels.

Canon originally licensed key technologies for SED televisions from Nano-Proprietary; the company then teamed with Toshiba to form a joint venture (SED, Inc.) to develop and manufacture the televisions. Canon transferred its patent licenses to SED, Inc. and Nano-Proprietary sued, claiming the license couldn’t be transferred because Toshiba held decision-making authority in the joint venture. Canon fought the lawsuit—and eventually bought out Toshiba’s share of SED, Inc.—Canon was eventually found to have breached the license agrreement, although a jury found Nano-Proprietary had sustained no damages, although the original license agreement was terminated. This left Canon in the awkward position of needing to re-negotiate a licensing agreement for key SED technology. Presumably, one source of Canon’s just-announced delay in its SED launch is the difficult in re-licensing the technology from Nano-Proprietary…or finding a way to work around it.

SED technology has the potential to offer flat panel screens which are brighter, offer higher contrast ratios, and consume less power than LCD flat-panel displays.