Following a recent legal victory against rival CoolerMaster, liquid-cooling specialist Asetek has issued a cease-and-desist order against Gigabyte and AMD, demanding that the manufacturers cease selling the WaterForce brand of GTX 980 products and the Fury X, respectively.
Earlier this year, Asetek won a patent infringement lawsuit against CoolerMaster, which was found to be using a pump design that violated Asetek's patents. Since the beginning of this year, CoolerMaster has had to pay a royalty rate of 25.375 percent for the sale of infringing products, which includes the likes of the Seidon 120V, Glacer 240L, and Nepton 140XL.
CoolerMaster also happens to make the liquid cooling system inside the Fury X, although it's not yet clear whether that cooler infringes on Asetek's patents. For its part, AMD doesn't believe that's the case.
"We are aware that Asetek has sued CoolerMaster," AMD said in a statement to ExtremeTech. "While we defer to CoolerMaster regarding the details of the litigation, we understand that the jury in that case did not find that the CoolerMaster heat sink currently used with the Radeon Fury X infringed any of Asetek’s patents."
Notably, Asetek doesn't have a licensing agreement in place with CoolerMaster, nor does it plan to issue one "in the foreseeable future."
"Asetek's attorneys have recently sent cease and desist letters to Gigabyte, demanding that it cease selling Giga-Byte’s GEFORCE GTX 980 Water Force (sold under at least model number GV-N980WAOC-4GD) because it contains the Seidon 120M found by the court to infringe Asetek's patents," said Asetek in a statement to Gamer's Nexus.
"Asetek's attorneys have also written a cease and desist letter to AMD, demanding that it stop selling its Radeon R9 Fury X product, because it infringes Asetek’s patents. Our attorneys have had some difficulty obtaining a Gigabyte GV-N98TXTREME W-6GD, but we expect to receive and analyse one very soon for infringement."
While it's unlikely that Asetek will be able to get Fury X and Gigabyte GPUs off store shelves, the move will encourage CoolerMaster to work with the company towards some sort of resolution, whether that be a licensing agreement or a percentage of sales revenue going to Asetek.
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