by SIG Sauer announced that they filed a patent infringement lawsuit against Springfield Armory yesterday. They allege that the magazines for the Springfield Hellcat infringe upon the patented design of the SIG P365 magazine.
From the complaint filed by SIG, it appears that this controversy has been brewing since December 2019. That was when SIG says they notified Springfield of a violation of one of their two patents on the magazines.
The complaint refers to the magazines in question as the “Accused Products”:
The Accused Products directly, jointly, indirectly, and/or willfully infringe one or more claims in the following SIG SAUER Patents: U.S. Patent Nos. 10,480,880 (“the’880 patent”) and 10, 962,315 (“the’315 patent”) (collectively, the “Asserted Patents”). Springfield Armory markets the Accused Products as being competitive to SIG SAUER’s P365 pistol magazines (the “P365 magazines”).
The case is filed in the US District Court for the Central District of Illinois, Rockford Division. SIG is seeking a declaration of patent infringement, a permanent injunction, and appropriate monetary damages.
Ron Cohen, President and CEO of SIG Sauer, Inc., had this to say:
“When the SIG SAUER P365 was introduced it took the market by storm as the most innovative high-capacity, micro-compact pistol to be introduced due to its magazine capacity, and quickly became one of the top selling handguns in the market due to this unprecedented innovation. SIG is not a litigious company, but given the extent of infringement by Springfield, SIG has a responsibility to protect both our intellectual property and the significant investment we make to develop our innovative products. As a company we are proud to yield more than 100 patents worldwide, with more than 40 patent applications currently pending, and we will protect the extensive research and design that goes into developing these patents rigorously.”
It will be interesting to see how this all shakes out. I don’t have a dog in this fight as I don’t own either of these handguns.