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Avery Dennison Files Antitrust Lawsuit Against 3M

  //house-home.news-articles.net/content/2010/10/2 .. dennison-files-antitrust-lawsuit-against-3m.html
  Published in House and Home on Thursday, October 21st 2010 at 16:35 GMT by Market Wire
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PASADENA, Calif.--([ BUSINESS WIRE ])--Avery Dennison Corporation (NYSE:AVY) filed a lawsuit today charging 3M Corporation and subsidiary 3M Innovative Properties Company with unlawful monopolization and unfair competition in two markets for retroreflective sheeting, a technology used to enhance the nighttime visibility of road signs and other highway and transportation products. 3M has market share of nearly 100 percent in one of the two markets and at least 70 percent in the other.

Nine separate counts, including violations of the Sherman Act, the Lanham Act, the Cartwright Act, and several other California state laws, as well as claims of fraud and false advertising, are contained in the complaint, which was filed in the United States District Court for the Central District of California. Avery Dennison is seeking both monetary damages and an injunction against 3M.

According to the complaint, 3M has attempted to increase its monopoly power by unlawfully seeking to prevent Avery Dennison from offering its new OmniCubea" product, which meets the most recent standard for high-performance retroreflective sheeting defined by standards organization ASTM International. This standard, called Type XI, is used by governments to qualify products in open bidding for highway signage contracts.

According to the complaint, 3M induced ASTM International to declare Type XI as a new standard, at a time when 3M had the only Type XI product on the market, by promising to withdraw certain patent claims. However, when Avery Dennison introduced OmniCubea", its Type XI product, 3M sued Avery Dennison for patent infringement despite its representations to the ASTM that it would not pursue patents covering the standard (3M has even sought a preliminary injunction to block sales of OmniCubea" without a full trial on the merits of its patent suit).

The complaint further notes that if Avery Dennison is precluded from selling OmniCubea", then 3M will be the only source of Type XI sheeting. Sole-source materials may not be purchased with Federal funds such as those available under the American Recovery and Reinvestments Act, 3Ma™s actions may slow the adoption of Type XI sheeting and the delivery of its improvements in safety to American highways.

About Avery Dennison

Avery Dennison (NYSE:AVY) helps make brands more inspiring and the world more intelligent. For 75 years the company has been a global leader in pressure-sensitive technology and materials, retail branding and information solutions, and organization and identification products for offices and consumers. A FORTUNE 500 company with sales of $6 billion in 2009, Avery Dennison is based in Pasadena, California and has employees in over 60 countries. For more information, visit [ www.averydennison.com ].