Intellectual Property

  • August 29, 2025

    Stewart Again Rebuffs Nat. Security In New Discretion Batch

    Acting U.S. Patent and Trademark Office Director Coke Morgan Stewart issued only a handful of decisions on whether to discretionarily deny Patent Trial and Appeal Board petitions over the last week, and nearly all favored the challenger.

  • August 29, 2025

    Cox Tells Justices $1B Verdict Risks 'Mass' Internet Evictions

    Cox Communications Inc. asked the U.S. Supreme Court Friday to rule it should not face copyright liability for its internet customers' music piracy, arguing in its opening appeal brief that the Fourth Circuit incorrectly affirmed a Virginia federal jury verdict that led to a $1 billion award.

  • August 29, 2025

    NC Tex-Mex Chain Says Ex-Employee Defected With Recipes

    The owner of a string of Tex-Mex restaurants has accused a former employee in North Carolina Business Court of taking the chain's proprietary recipes, menus, drinks and decor several states away to use at another restaurant in Missouri.

  • August 29, 2025

    NeoGenomics Scores Win In Natera DNA Test Patent Suit

    A North Carolina federal judge put an end to genetic testing company Natera Inc.'s lawsuit accusing NeoGenomics Laboratories Inc. of patent infringement over DNA cancer test technology, finding the patent claims at issue are invalid.

  • August 29, 2025

    UK Litigation Roundup: Here's What You Missed In London

    This past week in London has seen Prosecco DOC Consortium bring an intellectual property claim against a distributor, the Serious Fraud Office bring a civil recovery claim against the ex-wife of a solicitor jailed over a £19.5 million fraud scheme, and law firm Joseph Hage Aaronson & Bremen LLP sue its former client, the bankrupt Indian tycoon Vijay Mallya. Here, Law360 looks at these and other new claims in the U.K.

  • August 29, 2025

    M&A Attys Hand Tasks To 'Machines' In Careful Embrace Of AI

    Artificial intelligence is no longer just a back-office tool in mergers and acquisitions legal work, but is increasingly embedded in core deal processes that help attorneys manage due diligence, draft agreements and assess risk.

  • August 29, 2025

    'I'm Flabbergasted': Fla. Atty's Accusers Rip Bar For Inaction

    More than a year after it began receiving complaints that a Florida lawyer was ghosting clients, the state bar has yet to take action — highlighting what experts call a slow-moving process that can fail to keep pace with expansive alleged frauds.

  • August 28, 2025

    Trump Ends Bargaining Rights For Workers At More Agencies

    President Donald Trump on Thursday signed an executive order that purports to remove collective bargaining rights from federal workers at several more agencies, including NASA, the National Weather Service and the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office, a move that one union slammed as "retaliation."

  • August 28, 2025

    3rd Circ. Agrees Natera Doesn't Owe $45M In False Ad Fight

    The Third Circuit Thursday affirmed a lower court's decision to take genetic testing company Natera off the hook from paying $45 million in damages to rival CareDx, saying in an unpublished opinion that CareDx failed to prove Natera actually deceived consumers through false statements about a Natera test's superiority.

  • August 28, 2025

    CBP, ITC Say Masimo Suit Over Apple Watch Ruling Misplaced

    The U.S. International Trade Commission and U.S. Customs and Border Protection balked at Masimo's request that a D.C. federal court temporarily block a ruling allowing imports of redesigned Apple Watches despite the companies' patent dispute, saying it's seeking relief in the wrong places.

  • August 28, 2025

    Del. Judge Rejects J&J Unit's $12M Interference Claim

    Johnson & Johnson unit DePuy Synthes Sales Inc. could not persuade a Delaware federal judge that it invented the technology behind an RSB Spine LLC spinal fusion surgery patent a jury says it owes $12 million for infringing.

  • August 28, 2025

    PNC Urges Justices Not To Review Nixed USAA $218M Verdict

    PNC Bank said the U.S. Supreme Court should not review a Federal Circuit decision erasing a $218 million patent infringement verdict for USAA, which has argued the case is essentially identical to another that resulted in an opposite ruling.

  • August 28, 2025

    Barings Denied Ex-Employee Emails In Corporate Raid Case

    Investment giant Barings LLC can't force five former employees to hand over their personal emails and text messages in a corporate-raiding suit because their current employer doesn't have them, nor does it have a right to them, a North Carolina Business Court judge ruled.

  • August 28, 2025

    IP Notebook: 'Lazy Reaction' Vids, Lafufus, Proud Boys TM

    In this round of emerging copyright and trademark issues, Law360 delves into "lazy reaction video" lawsuits from YouTube creators who accuse others of pilfering video views, and the attempt by the creator of Labubu plush dolls to get ahead of the "Lafufu" knockoff craze.

  • August 28, 2025

    Attys, Judge Mull Next Steps In 'Ugly House' Trademark Trial

    A Delaware federal judge took a stab on Thursday at focusing post-trial briefing after three days of testimony on home-selling franchise HomeVestors of America Inc.'s claims that Warner Bros. Discovery's "Ugliest House In America" series has infringed its trademarks and confused customers.

  • August 28, 2025

    PTAB Won't Make USPTO Give William Shatner A Patent

    The Patent Trial and Appeal Board has affirmed the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office's conclusion that "Star Trek" star William Shatner's proposed smartphone organization system doesn't meet patent eligibility requirements.

  • August 28, 2025

    Fed. Circ. Gives Google Another Go At Database IP Challenge

    The Federal Circuit on Thursday revived Google's challenge to the validity of claims in a pair of patents covering database systems, faulting the Patent Trial and Appeal Board for excluding portions of Google's arguments and ordering the board to apply some of the company's claim construction on remand.

  • August 28, 2025

    Truist, Ex-Execs Clash In Bids To End Poaching Dispute

    Charlotte, North Carolina-based Truist Financial Corp. and its mortgage banking arm resisted a bid for a pretrial win by its former executives' new employer, arguing that troves of evidence sustain its claims that over 50 employees were illegally poached, costing the bank tens of millions of dollars in losses.

  • August 28, 2025

    Apple, Comcast, Others Face Headwater Patent Suit Spree

    Headwater Research LLC has fired off a salvo of patent infringement suits in two Texas federal courts against technology giants Apple Inc., Amazon and Google, as well as wireless services and cable providers Comcast, Charter Communications Inc. and Dish Network, after winning $279 million against Samsung at trial over similar claims and $175 million from Verizon in a case that later settled.

  • August 28, 2025

    USPTO Offers Streamlined Patent, TM Assignment Search Tool

    The U.S. Patent and Trademark Office is upgrading its search system for patent and trademark assignment records with a web-based platform beginning next month, the agency said.

  • August 28, 2025

    Sonos Gets Fed. Circ. To Revive IP From $33M Google Verdict

    A California federal judge wrongly invalidated claims of Sonos Inc. speaker patents after its $32.5 million jury trial win over Google LLC, the Federal Circuit said Thursday as it largely reversed the judge's holding.

  • August 28, 2025

    9th Circ. Reinstates Copyright Suit Over Liturgical Song

    The Ninth Circuit has revived a copyright suit by a songwriter who claimed that elements of his liturgical song were copied by a Christian songwriter, ruling that even though some evidence was rightly excluded, there were still triable elements to the case.

  • August 28, 2025

    First Chief PTAB Judge Remembered As Industrious Leader

    Colleagues and loved ones of James Donald Smith — the first chief judge of the Patent Trial and Appeal Board who died this spring — remembered him as a superb leader, talented violist and dear friend at a memorial service on Saturday that featured a reading of a letter from former President Barack Obama.

  • August 28, 2025

    Perplexity AI Settles TM Fight Over 'Comet' Name

    Perplexity AI and software company Comet ML have settled a trademark dispute over the "comet" mark that was sparked after Perplexity launched a search engine under that name.

  • August 27, 2025

    47 AGs Push Search, Payment Platforms To Stop 'Deepfakes'

    A bipartisan coalition of 47 attorneys general called on search engine giants Google, Microsoft and Yahoo, as well as PayPal, Apple and other payment platforms, to step up their efforts to stop the spread of computer-generated "deepfake" images and videos, warning about the need to protect young internet users.

Expert Analysis

  • A Word On Ensuring Precision In Patent Claim Construction

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    The Federal Circuit's recent decision in Express Mobile v. Meta Platforms, overruling the Patent Trial and Appeal Board's interpretation of the term "style," highlights the importance of articulating claim constructions that are as clear as possible, says Derrick Carman at Robins Kaplan.

  • Series

    Playing Mah-Jongg Makes Me A Better Mediator

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    Mah-jongg rewards patience, pattern recognition, adaptability and keen observation, all skills that are invaluable to my role as a mediator, and to all mediating parties, says Marina Corodemus.

  • Does Research Tool Safe Harbor Cover AI Drug Development?

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    As artificial intelligence increasingly takes root in drug development, many questions may emerge regarding current gaps in courts' application of the research tool exception to the safe harbor defense against patent infringement, and whether that defense applies to AI-based tools, say attorneys at Arnold & Porter.

  • Tips For Business Users After 2 Key AI Copyright Decisions

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    Because two recent artificial intelligence copyright decisions from the Northern District of California — Bartz v. Anthropic and Kadrey v. Meta — came out mostly in favor of the developers using the plaintiffs' works to train large language models, business users should proceed with care, says Chris Wlach at Acxiom.

  • Series

    Law School's Missed Lessons: Navigating Client Trauma

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    Law schools don't train students to handle repeated exposure to clients' traumatic experiences, but for litigators practicing in areas like civil rights and personal injury, success depends on the ability to view cases clinically and to recognize when you may need to seek help, says Katie Bennett at Robins Kaplan.

  • Copyright Takeaways From 2 Calif. GenAI Rulings

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    Two California federal court decisions suggest that the fair use defense may protect generative artificial intelligence output, but given the ongoing war between copyright holders and AI platforms, developers should still consider taking steps to reduce legal risk, says Lincoln Essig at Knobbe Martens.

  • Opinion

    Juries Are Key In Protecting The Rule Of Law

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    Absent from the recent discourse about U.S. rule of law is the crucial role of impartial jurors in protecting the equitable administration of justice, and attorneys and judges should take affirmative steps to reverse the yearslong decline of jury trials at this critical moment, says consultant Clint Townson.

  • Opinion

    4 Former Justices Would Likely Frown On Litigation Funding

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    As courts increasingly confront cases involving hidden litigation finance contracts, the jurisprudence of four former U.S. Supreme Court justices establishes a constitutional framework that risks erosion by undisclosed financial interests, says Roland Eisenhuth at the American Property Casualty Insurance Association.

  • Brand Protection Takeaways From OpenAI Trademark Case

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    The ongoing battle between IYO and OpenAI offers critical lessons on diligent trademark enforcement and proactive risk management for startups and established players alike navigating branding in the rapidly evolving artificial intelligence sector, say attorneys at Dykema.

  • How Attys Can Use AI To Surface Narratives In E-Discovery

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    E-discovery has reached a turning point where document review is no longer just about procedural tasks like identifying relevance and redacting privilege — rather, generative artificial intelligence tools now allow attorneys to draw connections, extract meaning and tell a coherent story, says Rose Jones at Hilgers Graben.

  • IP Due Diligence Tips For AI Assets In M&A Transactions

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    Artificial intelligence systems' integration into business operations creates new considerations for intellectual property due diligence in mergers and acquisitions and financing transactions, and implementing a practical approach to identifying AI assets can help avoid litigation and losses, say Armin Ghiam and Senna Hahn at Hunton.

  • How To Strengthen A Case By Mastering Expert Witness Prep

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    A well-prepared expert witness can bolster a case's credibility with persuasive qualifications, compelling voir dire responses and concise testimony that can withstand cross-examination, says Allison Rocker at Baker McKenzie.

  • A Look At Florida's New Protected Series LLC Legislation

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    A new law in Florida enhances the flexibility of using limited liability companies as the entities of choice for most privately held businesses, moving Florida into a small group of states with reliable uniform protected series legislation for series LLCs, says Louis Conti at Holland & Knight.

  • Opinion

    New USPTO Leadership Must Address Low-Quality Patents

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    With John Squires in line to become the new director of the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office, the agency has an opportunity to refocus its mission on prioritizing quality in patent examination and taking a harsher stance against low-quality patents and patent trolls, says Jill Crosby at Engine Advocacy & Foundation.

  • Opinion

    High Court Must Overrule Outdated Patent Eligibility Doctrine

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    A certiorari petition should directly ask the U.S. Supreme Court to correct its 1972 patent decision in Gottschalk v. Benson, the critical point where patent eligibility law veered from the statutory text toward judicial policymaking, says Robert Greenspoon at Dunlap Bennett.

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