Corning Settles Suit with Picvue, Former Corning Worker Arrested

CORNING, N.Y. & TAINAN, Taiwan, Oct. 20 -- Corning Inc. and Picvue Electronics Ltd., a Taiwan manufacturer of components used in display devices such as TVs, laptops and mobile phones, have settled a trade secret and copyright infringement lawsuit. Picvue will compensate Corning for wrongdoing and fire the employees responsible, according to a Corning press release, but the terms of the settlement are confidential. A Kentucky man who allegedly worked for Corning has been arrested by the FBI.

Corning filed suit against Picvue in 2002 for violating the company's copyrighted fusion draw technology for manufacturing flat panel display glass. Picvue has also agreed to respect Corning's proprietary rights and is cooperating with the US attorney for the Western District of New York in an ongoing investigation of any criminal misconduct, Corning said.

According to published reports, Jonathan Sanders, of Lawrenceburg, Ky., was arrested Thurday by the FBI's Buffalo office and charged with stealing trade secrets from Corning. According to the Star-Gazette of Elmira, N.Y., the FBI has filed a complaint in federal court stating that Sanders stole documents from Corning's Harrodsburg, Ky., plant containing secret information about Corning's process for manufacturing glass substrates used in making its active matrix liquid crystal displays (LCD). Sanders sold those documents, and others, to representatives of Picvue, receiving $34,000 in two transactions. Sanders was scheduled to be arraigned today in US District Court in Lexington, Ky, and the investigation remains open. The FBI said the investigation of Sanders started in October 2001 and the US attorney's office in Rochester will prosecute the case.

Through its Display Technologies business, Corning makes two glass substrate compositions, Corning 1737 and EAGLE2000 glass, for active matrix LCDs. Over the last few years, Corning has been investing to expand its capacity to produce glass substrates for the LCD market. It has an LCD production plant in Harrodsburg and a Taiwan manufacturing facility that it opened in 2001. The company is building a second facility on the island, in Taichung, which is expected to begin production soon.

For more information, visit: www.corning.com