Legal Dispute Continues as DuPont Sues Invista

Wilmington, DE, Nov. 11, 2008--DuPont Co. has filed a patent-infringement lawsuit against Koch Industries' Invista unit, the latest round in a legal fight.

DuPont alleges that Invista is infringing a patent related to nylon engineering resins by breaching a patent deal the two firms have. The resins in question are the subject of a suit Invista filed against DuPont and Rhodia SA in August.

Both cases were filed in federal court in New York.

Invista alleged DuPont and Rhodia are teaming up to misappropriate its technology and are unlawfully using trade secrets to expand in the nylon chemicals business. The firms denied the charges.

Invista says it bought the technology to make a critical chemical in the creation of the resins in question as part of its $4.2 billion purchase of DuPont's fibers business in 2004. But DuPont contends Invista isn't allowed to use DuPont technology to make the resins for several years.

In a separate development, Invista last week filed an amended lawsuit against DuPont. The amended lawsuit still asserts Invista's allegations that DuPont misappropriated Invista's chemical process technology called adiponitrile, and is using it to assist Paris-based Rhodia to build a plant in Asia to manufacture adiponitrile.

The 2004 deal is also subject to a lawsuit, as Invista claimed in a March filing that plants it acquired had serious safety deficiencies that needed fixing. DuPont has sought to have the federal case dismissed, saying the sale agreement was in fact violated by Invista and that DuPont is protected from the legal claims raised by Invista.