TELEVISION PATENTS

Otago Daily Times, Issue 26033, 22 December 1945, Page 4

TELEVISION PATENTS

AMERICAN FILM INTERESTS ANTI-TRUST COMPLAINT . NEW YORK, Dec. 18. To prevent television competition with moving pictures, American film interests gained control of advanced British patents and conspired to prevent their use in the western hemisphere. This charge was made by the Attorney-general, Mr T. C. Clark, m an anti-trust complaint filed in the Federal Court. The defendants include Paramount Pictures Corporation, its subsidiary. Television Productions Corporation, General Precision Equipment Corporation, alleged to be the largest stockholder in the Twentieth CenturyFox Film Corporation, Scophony Corporation of America, allegedly organised by Television Productions and General Precision in furtherance of the conspiracy, Scophony Limited, a British firm which owned basic patents. The complaint declared that the conspiracy forestalled the manufacture and development of improved British equipment in the United States for more than three years. The complaint related that Scophony Limited developed two new ideas in 1937 ana 1939—the supersonic and skiatron systems, used during eight months prior to the outbreak of war In televising prize fights and horse races in London. The systems reproduced images 24 by 20 inches in home receivers compared with American images of 6 by 8 inches The skiatron valve later became the basis for the development of radar. The war halted further development of the systems In England, and Scophony Limited sought to transfer the experimentation to the United States. Paramount and Twentith Century expressed their willingness to furnish the necessary capital, provided they would not be obliged to make the Scophony inventions available to their competitors. As a result, Paramount and Twentieth Century formed the Scophony Corporation of America in 1942, which received all the patent rights for the western hemisphere. Scophony Limited in the cartel agreement retained the exclusive manufacturing sales rights in the eastern hemisphere. The complaint added that the Scophony Corporation directors, representing Paramount and Twentieth Century subsidiaries, failed to attend directors’ meetings, effectively preventing the corporation from doing business, and thus suppressing the manufacture and sale of equipment and preventing competitors “from employing essential advances in the television art.'! The Government is seeking an injunction to restrain the defendants from carrying out their existing electionships ■ and free patents generally.