Is Florida going after Microlipid Technologies?

Microlipid Technologies, formerly known as Neofat Industries Inc, is being targeted by the Florida Office of Financial Regulation.  Microlipid Technologies is an intellectual property company.  It has one employee –the owner – Gus Papathanasopoulos and has no physical location.  What the company, or more specifically, what Mr. Papathanasopoulos does have is a patent titled “Micro-molecular hyper-saturation of conventional cooking oils for high altitude and confined space applications.” This basically means that the company can process and mix vegetable oils or meat fats with super healthy oils without using the unhealthy hydrogenation process.

Unfortunately, according to the state of Florida, Microlipid Technologies has been selling securities without registering the company within the state.  The company and the owner have been assessed fines of 3.1 million dollars and have until the end of April to make the payments. 

The charges include the following:

• Papathanasopoulos actually holds the patents, yet investors claimed they believed the company actually owned the patents.
• Investors were led to believe they would receive repayment plus interest of any investment in the company within three months of the patent being registered.  This did not happen for their approximately 125 investors.
• Papathanasopoulos gave himself loans on behalf of the company then, as CEO of the company, forgave his own loans.

There are actually two separate fines.  One (1.56 million) is to be paid by Papathanasopoulos and the other (1.56 million) is to be paid by the company.

Papathanasopoulos is currently requesting a hearing and states that he was confused as to the time in which he was given to respond to the initial complaint, which was filed January 9, 2014.  It appears that, although fines have already been assessed and are past due, he is not yet done fighting for his company.

After reviewing the Microlipid Technology company website, it does not appear that this company has any real output.  It’s obvious they have no fixed business address and if you can call the owner an employee, then it has only one employee.

Between the fact that it holds patents without actually manufacturing anything, the company might mistakenly be called a patent troll.  Most people by now are now at least aware of what derogatively is called “patent trolls” – those companies that hold patents just to file lawsuits and win money from the courts.  However, of the several lawsuits Microlipid Technologies has been involved in the past few years, they have been the defendant and not the plaintiff.  It’s unclear what the future of this company is to be.