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2 Pat. Trademark & Copy. J. Res. & Ed. 376 (1958)
The Parking Meter Industry

handle is hein.journals/idea2 and id is 386 raw text is: The Parking Meter Industry* GEORGE E. FROST, Principal Investigator S. CHESTERFIELD OPPENHEIM, Principal Consultant NEIL F. TWOMEY, Research Assistant SUMMARY On March 28, 1944, Judge Leahy rendered decision in favor of the Gov- ernment and against Vehicular Parking, Ltd., a patent holding corpora- tion, and substantially all of the prewar members of the parking meter industry. The government complaint had alleged, and Judge Leahy found, that the patent licenses entered into by Vehicular Parking and the associated business activities of the defendants, gave rise to illegal price fixing and other violations of the Sherman Act. The decision indicated that the patents of Vehicular would be made subject to compulsory licenses. Later decrees so ordered. There have been two major entries into the parking meter business since the decision and decrees. One was Magee-Hale Park-O-Meter Company. The other was International Meters, Incorporated, whose product did not involve features covered by any of the Vehicular patents and did not give rise to any patent infringement controversies. In 1952 the International meter business was sold to Mi-Co-a prewar meter concern which has since marketed the meter. Vehicular charged that the Magee-Hale Meter construction infringed four Vehicular patents. After some initial legal proceedings, Magee-Hale (organized by Carl Magee and others who had been instrumental in build- ing up Dual Parking Meter Company, the principal prewar concern) elected to take a license under the compulsory licensing decree provisions. The principal stockholder of Magee-Hale finally purchased the Vehicular patents for $95,000, bringing the controversy to an end. There are six significant parking meter manufacturers at the present time, the same number as in the prewar period. Data indicate that Dun- can Parking Meter Corporation, the chief competitor to the Dual Parking Meter Company during the prewar period, is the leading concern in terms of sales, with substantially more than a third of the sales volume, followed by Magee-Hale with about a third of the total sales volume. The other Mr. Frost prepared this research interim report on Project 4a, Effects of Certain Antitrust Decrees Involving Patents as a Major Factor.

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