E-cigarette patents battle heats up

Fontem Ventures, a wholly owned subsidiary of U.K.-based Imperial Tobacco, has filed patents suits in California against nine U.S. e-cigarette suppliers, including the top three—Lorillard’s Blu Ecigs, NJOY and Logic—which together account for about 80 percent of the $2 billion U.S. market, according to a Financial Times story by Duncan Robinson in London and Shannon Bond in New York.

Several other of the companies named, including Fin Branding, CB Distributors, Ballantyne Brands and Vapor Corp., are said to be among the top 10 in share of retail sales.

Robinson and Bond commented that big tobacco companies were relatively slow to enter the e-cigarette market, but said they were making up for lost time by using their size and financial firepower to take over a market that, while worth $3 billion globally, was still dominated by smaller players.

The full story is at http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/0d5e20ec-a877-11e3-a946-00144feab7de.html#axzz2vvbV4DmN.