Vizio recently announced that it had become the second largest shipper of HDTVs in America after a big Q4 2008. The firm released a statement last week announcing it had asked the FCC to stop what Vizio calls unreasonable patent enforcement policies by Funai Electronics Co., Ltd.

According to Vizio Funai is not complying with patent license agreements that the FCC adopted for digital TV standards for America. Vizio is trying to get the FCC to stop Funai from unreasonable and discriminatory patent enforcement policies while the FCC is considering a petition for declaratory ruling on the topic.

Funai is allegedly demanding "windfall" royalties for a single patent that is equivalent to the cost of licensing a group of over 30 patents owned by seven different companies. Funai's demands are called extortionate by Vizio and the firm says that Funai is threatening to exclude Vizio products from the American market if the TV maker doesn’t pay.

Via Vizio