The Supreme Court granted the United States Patent and Trademark Office’s petition for certiorari in In re Tam, 117 USPQ2d 1101 (Fed. Cir. 2016). In that case, the USPTO denied registration of an application to register the...more
10/3/2016
/ Disparagement ,
First Amendment ,
Football ,
Free Speech ,
Lanham Act ,
Music ,
Music Industry ,
Petition for Writ of Certiorari ,
Redskins ,
SCOTUS ,
The Slants ,
Trademark Registration ,
Trademarks ,
USPTO
The Southern District of New York recently booted shoe manufacturer LVL XIII Brands, Inc.’s trade dress infringement suit against Louis Vuitton Malletier S.A. in LVL XIII Brands, Inc. v. Louis Vuitton Malletier S.A.. At issue...more
9/22/2016
/ Fashion Branding ,
Fashion Design ,
Fashion Industry ,
Intellectual Property Protection ,
Lanham Act ,
Louis Vuitton ,
Retail Market ,
Summary Judgment ,
Trade Dress ,
Trademark Infringement ,
Trademark Litigation ,
Trademarks ,
USPTO
In Trader Joe’s Company v. Michael Norman Hallatt, the Ninth Circuit recently found that Trader Joe’s allegations of infringing conduct occurring within Canada supported a cognizable claim under the Lanham Act....more
9/8/2016
/ Canada ,
Extraterritoriality Rules ,
Grocery Stores ,
Lanham Act ,
Subject Matter Jurisdiction ,
Trademark Infringement ,
Trademark Litigation ,
Trademarks ,
Trader Joes ,
Unfair Competition ,
Use in Commerce
In an important decision delineating the boundaries of fair use of another person’s trademark, the Second Circuit announced a standard by which nominative fair use of a trademark will be evaluated in that Circuit in...more
The Federal Circuit recently provided additional guidance concerning whether an applied-for mark is generic in In re Cordua Restaurants, Inc., (May 13, 2016). This case stemmed from the United States Patent and Trademark...more
Belmora LLC filed a petition for reconsideration en banc of the Fourth Circuit’s FLANAX decision in Belmora LLC v Bayer Consumer Care AG, Appeal No. 15-1335 (4th Cir. March 23, 2016). As we previously have blogged...more
On April 20, 2016, the United States Patent and Trademark Office (“PTO”) filed a petition for a writ of certiorari to the Federal Circuit seeking Supreme Court review of that Court’s decision in In re Tam, 117 USPQ2d 1001...more
4/25/2016
/ Disparagement ,
First Amendment ,
Free Speech ,
Lanham Act ,
Petition for Writ of Certiorari ,
SCOTUS ,
Strict Scrutiny Standard ,
The Slants ,
Trademark Registration ,
Trademark Trial and Appeal Board ,
Trademarks ,
Unconstitutional Condition ,
USPTO
In today’s increasingly global economy, trademark owners are more frequently butting up against the territorial limitations of trademark law. It has long been a matter of black letter law that trademark rights are...more
4/18/2016
/ Bayer ,
False Advertising ,
False Association ,
Foreign Trademark ,
Lanham Act ,
Patent Litigation ,
Pharmaceutical Industry ,
Pharmaceutical Patents ,
Trademark Registration ,
Trademarks ,
Unfair Competition ,
USPTO
Recently, a District Court judge issued a scathing rebuke to the United States Patent and Trademark Office in Board of Trustees of the University of Alabama et al. v. Houndstooth Mafia Enterprises LLC, (N.D. Alabama February...more
The Second Circuit recently issued its latest ruling in a long-running legal battle over the trademark rights to the STOLICHNAYA trademark. In this latest decision in the 12-year dispute, the Court ruled that an agency of the...more
In a landmark First Amendment decision relating to the Lanham (Trademark) Act, the Federal Circuit, en banc, struck down § 2(a) of the Lanham Act, 15 U.S.C. § 1052(a), the statutory provision barring registration of...more
In a landmark First Amendment decision relating to the Lanham (Trademark) Act, the Federal Circuit, en banc, struck down § 2(a) of the Lanham Act, 15 U.S.C. § 1052(a), the statutory provision barring registration of...more
In a ruling bound to please 15 year-old boys everywhere, the USPTO Trademark Trial and Appeal Board (“TTAB”) reversed the Examining Attorney’s refusal to register the trademark NUT SACK DOUBLE BROWN ALE (in standard character...more
11/5/2015
/ Beer ,
Breweries ,
Corporate Counsel ,
Lanham Act ,
Offensive Language ,
Trademark Act ,
Trademark Application ,
Trademark Infringement ,
Trademark Litigation ,
Trademark Registration ,
Trademark Trial and Appeal Board ,
Trademarks ,
USPTO ,
Wine & Alcohol ,
Young Lawyers
The Ninth Circuit recently held that online retailer Amazon.com could be liable for infringing the trademarks of a watch manufacturer based upon Amazon’s product search results when shoppers search for the manufacturer’s...more
In Tartell v. South Florida Sinus and Allergy Center, Inc., the Eleventh Circuit reversed the district court’s finding that the plaintiff’s personal name had acquired distinctiveness as a trademark and that the defendant...more
In Sorensen v. WD-40 Company, the Seventh Circuit affirmed the district court’s finding that the use of the term “inhibitor” for a rust-inhibitor product was not trademark infringement and constituted a descriptive fair use. ...more
The Fourth Circuit recently ruled that a Defendant’s online article entitled “NAACP: National Association for the Abortion of Colored People” did not violate the trademark rights of the NAACP, the National Association for the...more
The Central District of California recently awarded over $5 million in attorneys’ fees and over $400,000 in costs, emphasizing the degree of success obtained by Defendants and the improper motivations of Plaintiff. The court...more
On May 8, 2015, the Trademark Trial and Appeal Board (the “Board”) issued a resounding blow to trademark applicants who seek to register others’ trademarks as parodies. In New York Yankees Partnership v. IET Products and...more
On April 20, 2015, in Nestle Purina Petcare Company v. The Blue Buffalo Company, Ltd., the Eastern District of Missouri denied a motion to dismiss claims for false and misleading advertising brought against the advertising...more
In Couture v. Playdom, Inc., the Federal Circuit held that the use of a mark on a website to offer services is not use in commerce sufficient to support an actual-use service mark application. As a result, the Court affirmed...more
In a unanimous decision, the Supreme Court in POM Wonderful LLC v. The Coca Cola Co. (June 12, 2014) held that the Food, Drug, and Cosmetic Act (FDCA) does not preclude a private party from bringing a Lanham Act claim...more
In Lexmark Int’l, Inc. v. Static Control Components, Inc. (March 25, 2014), the Supreme Court unanimously held that "to invoke the Lanham Act’s cause of action for false advertising, a plaintiff must plead (and ultimately...more
On July 29, 2014, the Second Circuit decided a Lanham Act false advertising case that clarified the circuit’s jurisprudence on demonstrating consumer confusion and competitive injury. In Merck Eprova AG v. Gnosis S.P.A. and...more