Company overview. Automotive Technologies International, Inc. ("ATI," website ati-i.com) is a closely held, privately owned U.S. company founded by inventor Dr. David S. Breed, who is named on hundreds of vehicular-safety patents. Patent-assignment records and company descriptions place its address in Denville, New Jersey, with Breed and related entities also listing Miami Beach, Florida. Company self-descriptions date the founding to 1988; at least one profile (MIT Technology Review) states 1998 — the sources conflict. It is not public and no parent company is identified. Third-party estimates (Salary.com, not audited filings) put the company under 25 employees with revenue below $5M, figures that should be treated as approximate.
Products / operations. ATI describes itself as an automotive safety research-and-development firm rather than a volume manufacturer. Its patented technology spans airbag crash sensors (including ball-in-tube and side-impact velocity sensors), occupant detection and seat weight/position sensing, side curtain and tubular/film airbags, airbag inflators, vehicle wiring harnesses, telematics and remote vehicle diagnostics, and vehicular RFID/wireless sensor assemblies. Later filings also cover non-automotive subjects such as secure testing, biometric identification, smartcards, and heads-up displays. Patent databases show roughly 400 U.S. patents issued to Breed as an ATI inventor, with activity continuing into the 2020s.
Patent-litigation posture. The tracked data show ATI as plaintiff in 2 cases and defendant in 0, both filed in 2006 in the U.S. District Court for the District of Delaware — a common but not plaintiff-specific patent venue. That 2-and-0 profile, combined with its inventor-founded, licensing-oriented model, places ATI closer to a patent-holding/enforcement entity than to an operating manufacturer being attacked; it is not a typical shell with no technical history, but its litigation role is consistently offensive. Public records indicate ATI filed numerous additional suits not reflected in the tracked set.
Notable cases and context. The tracked matters are Automotive Technologies International, Inc. v. American Honda Motor Co., Inc. et al. (filed 2006-03-17) and Automotive Technologies International, Inc. v. Hyundai Motor America et al. (filed 2006-06-16), both naming major automakers. Broader ATI litigation in the Eastern District of Michigan produced a 2007 Federal Circuit affirmance invalidating U.S. Patent 5,231,253 (side-impact sensors) for lack of enablement. Starting around 2011–2012, ATI transferred a large patent portfolio — reported at 300+ patents — to American Vehicular Sciences LLC (Frisco, Texas), an entity affiliated with Acacia Research that filed dozens of suits against automakers, primarily in the Eastern District of Texas.