Under the terms of the settlement, Wemax agreed to correct the brightness spec for its Nova projectors from 2,100 lumens to 1,300 lumens, a decrease of 38%. Wemax, an Amazon Selling Partner, is a “sub-company” of China-based Appotronics and the sister company of Formovie, a joint-venture between Appotronics and Beijing-based Xiaomi.
Epson filed the lawsuit “to ensure the implementation of internationally recognized and accepted brightness standards are used by brands to help consumers make informed purchasing decisions.”
In a press release announcing the settlement, the company went on to say, “The corrected specification is an accurate brightness claim that benefits consumers, the retail channel, and the larger industry.” Epson also cautioned shoppers to be “wary of misleading metrics listed as ‘Lux,’ ‘LED lumens,’ or ‘Lamp Brightness’ that fail to follow standardized methodology and therefore materially impacts a consumer’s ability to compare performance of projectors especially when shopping Amazon and other online marketplaces.”
The international standards Epson is referring to include projection measurements defined by the International Organization for Standardization (ISO) and the International Committee for Display Metrology (ICDM). The ICDM publishes the Information Display Measurement Standards (IDMS) methodology that defines color brightness and white brightness separately. The ISO standard that defines a methodology for projector measurement is ISO21118:2020.
“When these standards are followed, there is zero ambiguity regarding how projectors are to be properly measured and compared,” Epson said.
This is not Epson’s first lawsuit challenging misleading brightness specs. Last year, Epson prevailed in a similar action against Acrojoy, which resulted in the Chinese company agreeing to change the wholly deceptive brightness specs of 9,500 it had been publishing to 250 lumens — an astonishing decrease of 97% — across various online retail venues.
Epson America is based in Los Alamitos, CA and part of Japan’s Seiko Epson Corporation.
