Won't back down

Italian-born chemical engineer Aldo Laghi, who runs a multimillion-dollar medical equipment manufacturing firm, isn't a back-down kind of entrepreneur.

This is, after all, someone who once jumped out of planes for the Italian Army when he was a second lieutenant in the parachute regiment in the 1970s.

Yet even Laghi's resolve has been tested in a decade-long legal fight against a competitor in the niche industry of making liners used in prosthetics for amputees. The battle centers on a series of eight lawsuits and countersuits, all involving patent infringement allegations between Mount Sterling, Ohio-based Ohio WillowWood and Laghi's company, St. Petersburg-based Alps South.