Epson compatibles & refillables will soon be no more in the USA!

[mikling]

http://itc.epson.com/index.html

I wrote a little over a year ago about the possibility because I couldn't see how the current situation could continue. Well it finally happened. My estimate is that the current state of the newest printers can hardly advance dramatically and we've plateaued technically. ( When a good printer prints better than what a traditional chemical lab can output, I say good enough and we're there) The only way to ensure a stream of revenue for these companies is to focus on the supplies or consumables end and legally protect their rights. I'm not stating that what Epson is doing is correct BUT they are currently legally entitled to do what they are doing by current and past laws.

Really, when you get down to 1- 1.5pl droplets, how much smaller can you get and would it make any difference. It's a hard to sell for someone to drop their 2-3 year old printer to acquire a newer one because the newer ones are not substantially better, unlike the situation 4-5 years ago.

What it comes down to is that REFILLABLE cartridges, CISS and compatibles with non Epson skeletons will probably become illegal in the USA about December 16th, 2007. Ink sales, refilling and remanufacturing is not within the scope of the Epson legal moves and cannot be. Pretty much, if it is convenient, it will be illegal.

Like the chip situation where Epson led the way, expect Canon to follow in the footsteps. Epson has set the precedent so the road is paved I imagine.

The way I read the patents, if anyone uses any nook or cranny within the printhead assembly to secure a non Epson cartridge it will be illegal. A tube that is attached directly to the spigot and wires to the chip contacts will be OK. There's no wiggle room and that is why everyone has buckled and have to.

 

[pharmacist]

Fortunately the European Commisson issued laws which allows refilling of original cartridges to save the environment. Any attempt of manufacturers to sue refillers will be blocked by these laws. However: it is not allowed to imitate the original cartridges (like making compatible HP integrated carts). For Epson carts the legislations is in between: if Epson patented their chips in the EU, than the extent of these patents will or will not allow aftermarket manufacturers to come up with ARC.

 

[mikling]

The basis is not the chips at all in Epson's case in the USA. It is the imitation of the original shape as in the EU. Many people are confused about this. They are not after refilling either. They are simply after the easy and cheap to buy market and simple to use refillers.... again if you want it easy you'll pay the original price. That's their premise. Looked at fairly, I can't see the president not signing the ITC finding so it's a done deal....but weirder things have happened before.

 

[Tin Ho]

The basis is not the chips at all in Epson's case in the USA. It is the imitation of the original shape as in the EU.

Thank you for updating this old litigation case to the forum. But please be clearer and more specific about the basis of this litigation case. The entire issue has something to do with Epson's 11 patents on their spongeless ink cartridges. It has little, or should I say nothing, to do with imitation of the look and shape of Epson ink cartridges. Michelin probably has lots of patents in its tires but it can not sue anyone for making round tires. Many Japanese cars imitate the look and shape of German cars. But no patent infringement litigation was filed because of that.

Well folks, the game is about over now. There will be no more after market Epson compatible cartridges in the market very soon. I feel fortunate that I never really liked Epson printers any way. I will not feel too bad for not able to buy Epson compatible ink cartridges. Obviously I find no reason for me to ever consider any Epson printers in the future either.

As far as Canon to follow the foot step of Epson, you bet it will try. But I suspect they will first seriously consider if they can afford to give their hard earned market share to HP. The winner of the Epson litigation is not Epson. It is HP. The loser of the litigation will not be those after market producers. It will be all the Epson printer owners. I remember my work in the past that involved in supply chain management. One of the basic rules in supply chain management is that a product would be sourced only if a secondary source of a similar product is available. Epson has done a great job in killing all secondary sources of Epson ink cartridges. I wonder if they know that they also shot their own foot as a primary source as well.

Interesting development of the litigation case. I think there will be more development to come. They probably have successfully defensed their patents but they may have put themselves in a defense position too for violating anti-trust laws.

 

[websnail]

A few things..

1. Epson will undoubtedly look to their auto reset chips to secure their hold on the market further

2. When they finally close out every option their printers will be put under the microscope by consumers looking to see if they really are worth all the money on consumables. Right now they aren't... Canons have them whipped in terms of quality, clarity and sheer longevity. Ink wastage in the models I was using (D88, R300, CX6600) were all appalling, especially the latter and that's going to be something that kicks them in the crotch.

3. Canon will probably continue with their current systems knowing full well that they can bury the competition by NOT adopting this strategy.

Let's bear in mind that Canon played a long waiting game when it came to its cartridge protection system.. They watched Epsons systems and learned multiple lessons from them. They took their time, watched to see how inventive people were and then figured lots of ways to frustrate the hell out of them. It worked too.. I'm expecting more of the same with this... a year, maybe two and we'll know whether they decide to go legal or just absorb Epsons market share.

Personally I'm expecting someone to come up with some new technology that blows inkjets out of the water.. but either way it's rather sad that the ITC went with this... can't say I'm surprised but heck they want to keep it all American don't they... more money and IP for the good ole' USA..

 

[Tin Ho]

A few things..

1. Epson will undoubtedly look to their auto reset chips to secure their hold on the market further

Do you mean Epson has auto reset chips on their cartridges? If so the cartridges in Epson printers will never become empty. Or are you trying to say Epson will soon deal with auto reset chips on after market cartridges? That would be interesting to see how Epson will do to deal with that. There are chip resetters available that can reset Epson chips. Those auto reset chips are only useful for converting Epson OEM cartridges for CFS assuming there are no more after market cartridges which includes all CFS, CIS, etc.

 

[websnail]

Good point TinHo.. hadn't really though that part through properly..

 

[mikling]

Espon's firmware will ask you if you'd like to proceed to continuing using a non epson cartridge if it detects it. This indicates that they accept that 3rd party chips will be around and they allow it by building that option within their firmware. Based on this I would think that they would not pursue 3rd party chips.

However, they are doing as much as they can to make these 3rd party chips not work properly by revising printer firmware on a rolling basis. In the last twelve months they've had at least three. Each revision made existing compatibles not recognizable thus creating havoc in the marketplace. Unfortunately many vendors either were not aware of what was going on or though aware, unloaded their old stock at attractive prices to hapless souls who then discovered the cartridges could not be recognized. I imagine those customers swore to never use compatibles again!

Their strategy is quite cunning because they can allow the market to load up on stock and then make that stock incompatible with new production printers.

In hindsight the patent that HP was granted that allowed cartridges to upgrade printer firmware makes a LOT of sense and could be of significant value.

 

[osculate]

I'm just curious... Do the newest Epson printers allow a person the do a nozzle cleaning for just the nozzles associated with one color of ink? (I just hate wasting all that ink from tanks/nozzles that aren't plugged.) And if not, would there be a way to force Epson to make this possible? And what about firmware for older printers... could nozzle cleaning from just one color be possible? Intuitively it sure seems like it should be. Any thoughts?

 

[Tin Ho]

I have yet to see any Epson printer that does individual cleaning cycle for each ink cartridges. Some canon printers have two groups of nozzles that can do cleaning cycles separately on each group. All Epson printers I know of will do a cycle of print head priming (cleaning) that sends a lot of ink into the waste ink tank after every power on, or every time you remove and re-install an ink cartridge. Every time it happens (and it happens a lot) you can see ink level decreased. I know how you feel about it. It can cause a heart attack when you see how much ink level is reduced from each cleaning cycle. I had an R300. I never bought any new Epson cartridges when the original set became empty, not even once. I simply bought a Canon instead.