Local inventor gets patent win against oilfield service company

By Estudio Chaloupka

The Federal Court of Appeals of Comodoro Rivadavia ordered Petroil, an Argentinian oilfield service company, to stop using a test equipment that was proved to be a copy of an already patented invention.

The patent infringement and unfair competition lawsuit was brought in November 2009 by Carlos Alberto Campanello, who claimed that Petroil had counterfeited and was using an oil industry related equipment of his own creation, and which patent had been granted to Campanello in October 2008 by the National Institute of Intellectual Property (INPI).

The equipment allows to test and control the vacuum-anchors of an oil platform, to determine their state, solidity and operational safety conditions. According to the plaintiff, in 2009 he learned that Petroil had begun offering oil platforms testing services by using an equipment identical to the one he had created. Although cease and desist letters were sent to both Petroil and third party service contractors, no answer was received.

In the lawsuit, Campanello argued that Petroil tried to disguise the counterfeited equipment by filing a patent application, that was rejected by INPI in January 2013. He also accused Petroil of unfair competition, for exhibiting the equipment as if it were of its own during an exposition addressed to small and medium-sized companies in December 2010.