Intellectual Property

  • February 25, 2025

    State Telecom Roundup: AI On Everyone's Minds

    It's been just over two years since artificial intelligence burst onto the scene in a big way with the launch of ChatGPT. After billions upon billions of dollars in investment, AI tools can be found everywhere from the Apple App Store to social media platforms to clothing websites.

  • February 25, 2025

    Warner Bros. Can't Nix 'ER' Ripoff Suit Over 'The Pitt'

    Warner Bros. Television can't nix a contract breach lawsuit filed by the estate of "ER" creator Michael Crichton alleging the media company's medical drama, "The Pitt," is an unauthorized reboot of "ER," after a California judge ruled the plaintiffs' evidence shows, on its face, WB's show is derived from "ER."

  • February 25, 2025

    Judge Lets RJ Reynolds, Altria Seal Docs From Juul Deal

    A federal judge in North Carolina on Tuesday granted requests by tobacco giant R.J. Reynolds Vapor Co. and rival Philip Morris' parent company to seal documents in their ongoing royalty dispute, keeping details of their licensing agreements with the vape brand JUUL confidential.

  • February 25, 2025

    J&J Says Samsung Is Breaking Deal Over Stelara Biosimilar

    Johnson & Johnson and Janssen Biotech have launched a breach of contract suit against Samsung Bioepis over their agreement to let Samsung launch a biosimilar version of J&J's blockbuster biologic Stelara before all patents expire, accusing the company of violating the provision against assigning or sublicensing the patent rights to other parties.

  • February 25, 2025

    Insulet May Face Choice: $452M Award Or Stifling Rival

    A Boston federal judge on Tuesday suggested that a medical device maker could have to choose between portions of its nine-figure trade secrets verdict it won against a rival or its request for a court order to permanently block sales of products based on the stolen technologies.

  • February 25, 2025

    Former Banner Witcoff Name Partner Dies At 99

    A retired name partner of intellectual property boutique Banner Witcoff has died at the age of 99, the firm announced Monday, saying he will be remembered as a pioneering IP attorney and a thoughtful colleague and mentor.

  • February 25, 2025

    Patent Exec Says Starbucks Is Liable For Atty's Statements

    A patent-licensing company executive pushed back on Starbucks Corp.'s attempt to exit his defamation lawsuit over statements from counsel for Starbucks, arguing the Florida federal court has jurisdiction partly because the executive lives in the district.

  • February 25, 2025

    Insurers Owe Chubb $3.3M For Safelite Defense Costs

    Two insurers must contribute $1.65 million each toward costs a Chubb unit incurred defending windshield repair company Safelite against a competitor's suit, an Ohio federal court ruled, finding the pair were not prejudiced by breaches of their policies' notice and voluntary payment provisions.

  • February 24, 2025

    Natera's $96M DNA Test Verdict Scrapped, Patents Axed

    A Delaware federal judge Monday threw out Natera's $96 million patent infringement verdict against CareDx after determining that the asserted claims in its patents related to DNA tests for organ transplant recipients are invalid.

  • February 24, 2025

    Fed. Circ. Shouldn't Assume Doctors Read Labels, Profs Say

    The Federal Circuit has been reviewing whether generic-drug companies induce infringement of their limited-use drugs based on a misunderstanding of how prescribing physicians do their job, law professors from Illinois and Pennsylvania have argued in a new paper.

  • February 24, 2025

    Patent Eligibility Appeals 'Will Not Go Away,' Justices Told

    Another plea to hear a patent eligibility case has been lodged at the U.S. Supreme Court, this time in an amicus brief from the owner of two invalidated patents covering medical machinery that warned "the problem will not go away. The problem will get worse and worse."

  • February 24, 2025

    Justices Told Illinois High Court Should Weigh Tire IP Dispute

    Atturo Tire Corp. has asked the U.S. Supreme Court to have the top court in Illinois address whether the Federal Circuit wrongly discarded a $10 million award against Toyo Tire Corp. for interfering with Atturo's business through patent settlements with other companies.

  • February 24, 2025

    'Yellowjackets' Makers Omit Overlaps With Film, Court Told

    Showtime, Lions Gate Entertainment Corp. and the makers of the TV show "Yellowjackets" use "self-serving descriptions" and "omit similarities" between the show and the 2015 film "Eden" in their bid to toss a suit alleging the hit series ripped off the movie, the filmmakers told a California federal court judge on Monday.

  • February 24, 2025

    DC Circ. To Hear Judge Newman's Appeal In April

    The D.C. Circuit has set a date in April to hear an appeal from Federal Circuit Judge Pauline Newman, who is fighting her suspension from the bench for refusing to undergo medical tests.

  • February 24, 2025

    Bezos Satellite Co. Seeks To Block His Paper In Docs Dispute

    A satellite facility launched by Jeff Bezos' Amazon wants a preliminary injunction to partially block Washington state's labor department from releasing records to the Bezos-owned Washington Post, arguing that the photos and documents are exempt under the state's public records law because they would expose sensitive trade secrets.

  • February 24, 2025

    Charter Communications Keeps Trade Secrets Suit In Conn.

    A Charter Communications Inc. trade secrets lawsuit against a former Colorado-based vice president will remain in Connecticut, a federal judge ruled from the bench on Monday, greenlighting the company's request for a preliminary injunction in its home state.

  • February 24, 2025

    USPTO Trademark Head, Ex-Solicitor To Depart This Week

    Two more senior leaders are leaving the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office — the current commissioner for trademarks, who is concluding his five-year term, and a longtime agency attorney who said he's departing as part of President Donald Trump's federal worker "deferred resignation" program. 

  • February 24, 2025

    Tax Software Co. Says Rival Is The Real Trade Secrets Thief

    Corporate-focused tax preparation software company Avalara, accused by Vertex Inc. of poaching workers to steal trade secrets, has asked to file counterclaims, arguing Vertex has actually done the illegal poaching.

  • February 24, 2025

    Placement Co. Hit With False Ads Suit Over Referral Model

    A company that places senior citizens in retirement homes was hit with proposed class claims alleging it falsely advertises free services and steers business away from communities that decline to participate in its "pay-to-play" business model. 

  • February 24, 2025

    Fed. Circ. Revives Irish Food Biz Kerry's Meat-Curing Patent

    Irish food flavoring business Kerry Group persuaded the Federal Circuit on Monday to order administrative patent board judges to take another look at a patent the company owns covering a purportedly new way to prepare cured meats.

  • February 24, 2025

    Filmmaker Seeks New IP Trial Against Shyamalan, Others

    A filmmaker has asked for a new copyright infringement trial against writer-director M. Night Shyamalan and his co-defendants Friday after a jury found that they did not have access to the film she claimed they infringed, arguing that the court failed to answer a crucial question from the jury before the verdict was delivered.

  • February 24, 2025

    Netflix Sinks Robocast Playlist Patents In Del. IP Suit

    A Delaware federal judge has sided with Netflix's arguments that a trio of Robocast patents covering playlist technology are invalid.

  • February 24, 2025

    Venable Litigator Jumps To Steptoe In California

    Steptoe LLP continues growing its West Coast team, announcing Monday it is bringing in a Venable LLP commercial trial lawyer as a partner in its Los Angeles and San Francisco offices.

  • February 24, 2025

    Supreme Court Skips Fee-Shifting, IP Web Scraping Questions

    The U.S. Supreme Court on Monday rejected petitions involving fee-shifting in copyright cases, whether judges or juries should decide what can be copyrighted, and if scraping public information online should be considered hacking under the Defend Trade Secrets Act when it is done by a computer.

  • February 24, 2025

    High Court Declines To Review Reach Of Trade Secrets Law

    The U.S. Supreme Court on Monday turned down a petition from a Chinese company asking it to review whether the Defend Trade Secrets Act of 2016 can apply extraterritorially.

Expert Analysis

  • Opinion

    6 Changes I Would Make If I Ran A Law School

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    Reuben Guttman at Guttman Buschner identifies several key issues plaguing law schools and discusses potential solutions, such as opting out of the rankings game and mandating courses in basic writing skills.

  • Nutraceutical Patent Insights As Market Heats Up

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    Companies entering the expanding nutraceutical market and seeking patents to protect their innovations should evaluate successful nutraceutical claim language and common patent challenges in this field, say attorneys at Sterne Kessler.

  • Firms Still Have The Edge In Lateral Hiring, But Buyer Beware

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    Partner mobility data suggests that the third quarter of this year continued to be a buyer’s market, with the average candidate demanding less compensation for a larger book of business — but moving into the fourth quarter, firms should slow down their hiring process to minimize risks, say officers at Decipher Investigative Intelligence.

  • Nintendo Suit May Have Major Impact On Video Game Patents

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    If Nintendo and The Pokémon Co. win their patent infringement case in Japan against Pocketpair, the game developer behind Palworld, it could pose new challenges for independent game creators — but it could also encourage innovation, says Charles Morris at Marshall Gerstein.

  • Teaching Your Witness To Beat The Freeze/Appease Response

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    In addition to fight-or-flight, witnesses may experience the freeze/appease response at trial or deposition — where they become a deer in headlights, agreeing with opposing counsel’s questions and damaging their credibility in the process — but certain strategies can help, says Bill Kanasky at Courtroom Sciences.

  • Think Like A Lawyer: 1 Type Of Case Complexity Stands Out

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    In contrast to some cases that appear complex due to voluminous evidence or esoteric subject matter, a different kind of complexity involves tangled legal and factual questions, each with a range of possible outcomes, which require a “sliding scale” approach instead of syllogistic reasoning, says Luke Andrews at Poole Huffman.

  • Netflix Dispute May Alter 'Source' In TM Fair-Use Analysis

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    ​The Ninth Circuit’s upcoming decision in Hara v. Netflix​, about what it means to be source-identifying​, could change how the Rogers defense protects expressive works that utilize trademarks in a creative fashion, says Sara Gold at Gold IP.

  • Fed. Circ. Ruling Shows Importance Of Trial Expert Specificity

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    The Federal Circuit’s recent ruling in NexStep v. Comcast highlights how even a persuasive expert’s failure to fully explain the basis of their opinion at trial can turn a winning patent infringement argument into a losing one, say attorneys at Barnes & Thornburg.

  • Think Like A Lawyer: Note 3 Simple Types Of Legal Complexity

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    Cases can appear complex for several reasons — due to the number of issues, the volume of factual and evidentiary sources, and the sophistication of those sources — but the same basic technique can help lawyers tame their arguments into a simple and persuasive message, says Luke Andrews at Poole Huffman.

  • Corporate Liability Issues To Watch In High Court TM Case

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    The U.S. Supreme Court will hear arguments in a trademark dispute between Dewberry Group and Dewberry Engineers next week, presenting an opportunity for the court to drastically alter the fundamental approach to piercing the corporate veil, or adopt a more limited approach and preserve existing norms, say attorneys at Bracewell.

  • Trending At The PTAB: Collateral Estoppel Continues Evolving

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    We are starting to see brighter lines on collateral estoppel involving Patent Trial and Appeal Board proceedings, illustrated by two recent cases that considered whether collateral estoppel should apply to factual findings on prior art from the PTAB in a later district court litigation, say attorneys at Finnegan.

  • Series

    Gardening Makes Me A Better Lawyer

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    Beyond its practical and therapeutic benefits, gardening has bolstered important attributes that also apply to my litigation practice, including persistence, patience, grit and authenticity, says Christopher Viceconte at Gibbons.

  • Litigation Inspiration: Reframing Document Review

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    For attorneys — new ones especially — there is much fulfillment to find in document review by reflecting on how important, interesting and pleasant it can be, says Bennett Rawicki at Hilgers Graben.

  • What Fed. Circ. Ruling Means For Patent Case Dismissals

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    ​​​​​​​The Federal Circuit's recent decision in UTTO v. Metrotech is significant because it specifically authorizes district courts to dismiss patent infringement lawsuits without a separate Markman hearing, but only when the meaning of a claim term is clear and case-dispositive, says Peter Gergely at Merchant & Gould.

  • The Fed. Circ. In October: Anti-Suit Injunctions And SEPs

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    The Federal Circuit's holding in Ericsson v. Lenovo, a complex global case involving standard-essential patents, will likely have broad consequences for practitioners, including by making it easier to obtain an anti-suit injunction, say attorneys at Knobbe Martens.

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