CES 2016: US Marshals raid hoverboard stand

Jan 09, 2016, 00:09
CES 2016: US Marshals raid hoverboard stand

The raid on the show floor, which involved federal law enforcement, was the result of a weekslong effort by Future Motion, a Silicon Valley startup that said it invented and patented a self-balancing electric skateboard that looks strikingly similar to the ones the marshals confiscated.

"We took action against Changzhou first because it was a direct knockoff", Kyle Doerksen, CEO of Future Motion, told Ars Technica's Cyrus Farivar, who broke this story.

Because of this, Future Motion, who thinks that the Chinese company downright stole their product, has appealed to the US justice system.

The raid on Changzhou First International Trade's CES booth is just the beginning of an ugly war over hoverboard patents.

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While there are many two wheeled designs of these sorts of self-balance boards, the OneWheel is a unique design and there are several utility patents that protect it. Future Motion wasn't keen to let that slip. The Onewheel sells for $1,500, while Changzhou said that its product will sell to retailers for $500.

It was promoting its Trotter electronic skateboard-what Bloomberg describes as looking "like a seesaw with one big wheel in the middle".

All of the banners, fliers, as well as signs that were promoting the product were carried away from the booth as the company's staffers were looking stunned, and bewildered. Six people from the company's legal team have been present along with the U.S. Marshals at the raid.

Doerksen says that preventing the Chinese company to sell the Trotter was not only about shutting down competition but it was also a precaution after many low-quality hoverboards have already started to ruin the electric skateboards' reputation by bursting into flames.

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USA marshals raid Chinese hoverboard booth at CES on Thursday afternoon.

After discovering Changzhou First International Trade's product late previous year, Doerksen sent a cease and desist letter in December demanding the company stop selling the product.

According to Bloomberg, Future Motion even approached Changzhou's booth before CES opened, but got nowhere. While it may end up being able to block sales of the surfing scooter in the US though, Future Motion will need other patents entirely - in China - to halt its manufacture.

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