Steelcorp accused of predatory practices

Steel Corp. of the Philippines (Steelcorp) is being accused of predatory practices by Sonic Steel Industries Inc. following a dispute about a manufacturing technology for aluminum-zinc coated metal sheets.

The much smaller Sonic Steel has been able to gain 70 percent of the local coated metal sheet market because of its cheaper price, thus threatening Steelcorp.

According to Sonic Steel lawyer Joel Ruiz Butuyan of the Roque & Butuyan Law Offices, Steelcorp is trying to monopolize the coated metal sheet industry "through a bastardized application of the Intellectual Property Law."

The technology, Butuyan explained, was previously patented in the US but that patent has since expired, releasing the technology to the public domain.

Unfortunately, Steelcorp. was able to "abuse" the IPR law by securing a copyright of the coated metal sheet.

Butuyan explained that by merely taking a photograph of the coated metal sheet and applying for a copyright of the visual appearance of the product, Steelcorp. is now claiming exclusive right to manufacture the said product.

A copyright, however, Butuyan explained, is supposed to cover only literary and artistic work and not a manufacturing technology which is supposed to be covered by a patent.

Sonic Steel, in fact, had filed two years ago a case with the Regional Trial Court of Imus, Cavite, questioning Steelcorp.’s exclusive claim over the manufacturing technology.

NBI raids steel plant for fake GI sheets

Operatives of the National Bureau of Investigation (NBI) last Tuesday raided a steel plant in Cavite and a warehouse in Valenzuela, Metro Manila on suspicion of manufacturing and stocking reportedly fake Galvalume 55 aluminum-zinc coated galvanized iron (GI) products.

Armed with a search warrant issued by Cavite City Regional Trial Court (RTC) vice-executive Judge Melchor Q Sadang, NBI agents swooped down on the production facility of Sonic Steel Industries Inc., in Barangay Hugo Perez, Trece Martirez City in Cavite "as there are good and sufficient reason to believe that a violation of the Intellectual Property law has been committed."

Another team of NBI agents, on the strength of a search warrant issued by Muntinlupa City Regional Trial Court Judge Alberto Lerma, raided Taisan Commercial, a warehouse located in Valenzuela which contained an estimated P54-million worth of the reportedly fake Galvalume GI products. Close to 10,000 sheets were confiscated by the raiding team.

The intelligence agents said they caught some persons "red-handed" for being in possession of engineering blueprints of a production line for aluminum-zinc galvanized iron (GI) products involving state-of-the-art technology believed stolen from Steel Corp. of the Philippines (Steelcorp), reputedly the market leader in the local GI industry.

The recovered blueprints reportedly bore the Steelcorp logo, indicating they were probably stolen from Steelcorp which operates the biggest integrated iron and steel factory in the country. The company is exclusively licensed by BIEC International Inc., the worldwide Galvalume licensor, to produce and sell the product in the Philippines.

The GI products confiscated were branded "Superlume" which Steelcorp believes was an imitation of their flagship product called Galvalume 55.

Steelcorp disclosed that the NBI is also poised to raid Sonic dealers, distributors and hardware stores who may also be prosecuted for possession and selling the reportedly fake Galvalume 55 GI products.