In a patent infringement lawsuit, recently filed in US District Court in San Francisco, Taiwanese chip designer Elan Microelectronics has sued Apple, alleging that the touch-screen technology used in the MacBook, iPhone, and iPod Touch infringes on two of its patents.

Talking to New York Times about the infringement case, Elan spokesman Dennis Liu said that the suit was filed as a last resort, after talks about the contentious multi-touch technology issue with Apple for nearly two years brought no avail.

Liu said: "We couldn't find a common viewpoint with Apple, so we decided we had to take action." In its statement issued Wednesday, Elan said it is seeking a ban against Apple, barring it from the production and sale of products that make use of Elan's patents.

Elan added that it owns the rights to the technology, which it calls 'multi-finger' technology, using perception of the finger's position on a touch screen to allow users ape a 'pinch' motion to zoom in and out, rotate images and execute other screen tasks.

The lawsuit against Apple is not the first one by Elan related to its patented touch-screen technology - in 2006, the company sued US firm Synaptics over breach of one of the patents in question this time around too, finally settling on a cross licensing pact!