TKS, Goss Agree to End Dumping Dispute

By: Jim Rosenberg Ending more than 14 years of legal wrangling, press manufacturers Tokyo Kikai Seisakusho Ltd., with a subsidiary in Irving, Texas, and Goss International Corp., headquartered in Bolingbrook, Ill., announced today that they have agreed to settle their disputes with each other and are taking steps to end pending litigation in the United States and Japan, as well as pending legislative and administrative matters in the United States.

Neither side will discuss terms of the agreement.

The companies said the resolution was in their and their customers' best interest, allowing them to offer their full product lines to the U.S. market.

The disputes can be traced to the mid-1990s, when Goss petitioned the U.S. government to investigate possible press dumping -- that printing equipment from TKS and three other overseas manufacturers was being sold in the U.S. at less than fair value. Such dumping was found to have occurred, and antidumping duties were imposed.

Goss later successfully sued TKS for violation of the Antidumping Act. Settlements were reached with the other press suppliers originally named in the suit before the case went to trial. The multimillion-dollar award led Japan to threaten a "clawback" remedy in view of the World Trade Organization's recognition of the Antidumping Act as contrary to U.S. trade treaty obligations. Evidence from the trial sent Goss back to the U.S. Commerce Department to re-open administrative procedures against TKS. The latter action was the subject of litigation in recent years between TKS and the U.S. government.

The agreement between TKS and Goss does not cover the dispute between TKS and the U.S. government, according to a lawyer for TKS. Goss joined the government's side as a defendant-intervenor in that suit at the New York-based U.S. Court of International Trade. But last week Goss filed a motion to withdraw from the case, and on Friday the motion was granted and the company was removed.

TKS' trade-court suit challenges the Commerce Department's final determination of its reconsideration of the sunset review of antidumping duties levied on TKS. It had determined last fall that antidumping duties on large TKS presses sold in this country should be restored, pending an appropriate finding by the U.S. International Trade Commission. The ITC so far has not re-opened its own review.