Intellectual Property

  • February 21, 2025

    Harry Manbeck, Former USPTO Head, Dies At 98

    Former U.S. Patent and Trademark Office leader and chief patent counsel at General Electric Co., Harry F. Manbeck Jr., died Wednesday. He was 98.

  • February 21, 2025

    9th Circ. Revives Atty's Ownership Claims Over Calif. Winery

    A Ninth Circuit panel on Friday revived an attorney's ownership claims over a California winery, finding factual disputes over an alleged oral agreement with the winery's former owner require a trial, while also upholding a jury's verdict that found a breach fiduciary duty claim against the attorney that awarded no damages.

  • February 21, 2025

    Off The Bench: White House Hosts PGA Tour-LIV Golf Summit

    In this week's Off The Bench, the two former rival pro golf tours join the president to discuss their long-delayed combination, several NBA teams support a bid for the U.S. Supreme Court to keep copyright claims in check, and prosecutors charge Chilean nationals with robbing the homes of high-profile athletes.

  • February 21, 2025

    Childish Gambino Nabs Fees In 'This Is America' IP Case

    A New York federal judge has ordered a Miami rapper to pay out nearly $287,000 in legal fees for litigating a failed copyright case targeting Childish Gambino's 2018 hit song "This Is America," less than a third of what the record label lawyers and others had asked for. 

  • February 20, 2025

    DOJ Says Job Protections For ALJs Are Unconstitutional

    The U.S. Department of Justice announced Thursday that it no longer backs long-standing job protections for administrative law judges, saying it has determined that the "multiple layers of removal restrictions" shielding ALJs are unconstitutional because they violate the separation of powers doctrine.

  • February 20, 2025

    Ex-Kirkland IP Atty Asks To Fire Her Bias Suit Atty 'For Cause'

    A former Kirkland & Ellis LLP intellectual property associate suing Kirkland over bias claims has urged a California federal judge to fire her counsel at Filippatos PLLC and force Filippatos to hand over her client file, disputing Filippatos' assertion that her professional misconduct allegations are a contrived attempt to avoid paying fees.

  • February 20, 2025

    Ex-ITC Commissioner Talks IP Before Heading To WilmerHale

    Former U.S. International Trade Commissioner Rhonda Schmidtlein stepped down this month after more than a decade at the agency, and on Thursday talked to Law360 about how she went from a small town in Missouri to one of the nation's top trade positions, along with what she wished practitioners in intellectual property disputes would do.

  • February 20, 2025

    What The ITC's Multiple Vacancies Mean For The Agency

    Three of the six commissioner seats on the U.S. International Trade Commission are now vacant, which experts say may not disrupt the quasi-judicial agency's work on disputes involving duties and intellectual property, but is at odds with how it was designed to operate.

  • February 20, 2025

    Meta, Roku, Samsung Fail In Attempt To Invalidate Ad Patent

    Meta Platforms, Roku Inc. and Samsung Electronics Co. Ltd. have lost a challenge at the Patent Trial and Appeal Board against claims in a patent that covers a way of targeting ads based on online activity.

  • February 20, 2025

    Generic-Drug Group Rallies Behind Appeal In Entresto Fight

    A generic-drug industry group is weighing in on the Federal Circuit's move last month to revive a patent tied to Entresto, Novartis Pharmaceuticals Corp's blockbuster heart drug, warning that "the pharmaceutical industry is watching this case closely."

  • February 20, 2025

    3rd Circ. Rejects Appeal In Dog Magnet Design Spat

    The Third Circuit on Thursday rejected an appeal in a case in which two businesses accused each other of stealing designs for pet-themed car magnets, saying that, because there is no final judgment in the case, one of the companies can't challenge the lower court's refusal to issue a final judgment.

  • February 20, 2025

    Amid Shake-Ups, USPTO Gets New Acting Deputy Director

    The U.S. Patent and Trademark Office has a new acting deputy director, with former chief adviser Will Covey taking over the role at a tumultuous time for the agency and federal government at large.

  • February 20, 2025

    X, Social Media Biz Settle TM Fight

    A social media and public relations firm's trademark suit against X Corp. over the social media platform's logo has come to an end after the parties told a California federal judge that they have agreed to drop all claims and counterclaims, avoiding a jury trial set to begin in December.

  • February 20, 2025

    Fed. Circ. Backs TTAB's Denial Of Health Co.'s Proposed TM

    The Trademark Trial and Appeal Board correctly denied a healthcare management company's bid to register "Formularyhub" because it's a descriptive term, the Federal Circuit said Thursday.

  • February 20, 2025

    Textbook Authors Seek Final OK Of $20M Royalties Deal

    A class of authors asked a New York federal judge Wednesday to give his final blessing to a $20 million settlement resolving their claims that an educational content company broke its publishing agreement by underpaying promised royalties, calling the deal "an excellent result under any metric."

  • February 20, 2025

    The Intercept's IP Claim Against OpenAI Holds Up, Judge Says

    A New York federal judge said Thursday that the only plausible allegation in The Intercept's lawsuit accusing Microsoft and OpenAI of removing copyright information from works used to train ChatGPT is over "regurgitations" of articles produced in the OpenAI-owned chatbot's outputs.

  • February 20, 2025

    Google Argues $20M Verdict Is Tied To 'Unverifiable' Testimony

    Google is defending its challenge to testimony from a patent licensing trial that led to a $20 million jury verdict against it, telling the full Federal Circuit that it is wrong to let "unsupported and unverifiable" assertions go in front of jurors.

  • February 20, 2025

    Judge Trims Atlanta Rap Producer's Copyright Suit

    A Georgia federal judge has pared a copyright infringement suit Atlanta rap producer Terrell Perry filed against several record labels for allegedly using his beats without permission in tracks by Rich Homie Quan, dropping Warner Music Group as a defendant and limiting the scope of what alleged infringement could be eligible for damages.

  • February 19, 2025

    What To Know About Trump's Likely Pick For USPTO Director

    Dilworth Paxson LLP partner John Squires is about to be nominated for director of the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office, about half a dozen sources told Law360 on Tuesday. Here's what you need to know about the attorney who made a name for himself at Goldman Sachs.

  • February 19, 2025

    Netflix Wants IP Atty Sanctioned Over Alleged Doc Sharing

    Netflix urged a California judge Tuesday to require a prolific patent plaintiff's former counsel to explain why they shouldn't be held in civil contempt and sanctioned for allegedly giving Netflix's confidential financial information to nonparty AiPi LLC, arguing discovery in another patent case has revealed AiPi is "shadow lead counsel."

  • February 19, 2025

    Walgreens Says $1B COVID Testing Award Must Be Nixed

    Walgreens is urging a Delaware federal judge to rethink his decision enforcing a $987 million arbitral award to a lab testing and diagnostics company in a dispute over COVID-19 tests, arguing Tuesday that he ignored that the arbitrator "invented" language in the contract to arrive at his conclusion.

  • February 19, 2025

    Gilead, Janssen Settle HIV Treatment Suits With Lupin, Apotex

    Gilead Sciences Inc. and Johnson & Johnson's Janssen unit settled their patent suits against Lupin and Apotex over generic versions of HIV treatments, according to filings in Delaware federal court on Wednesday.

  • February 19, 2025

    2nd Circ. Backs Amazon In Teri Woods Publishing Dispute

    A unanimous Second Circuit panel backed a lower court's decision to dismiss Teri Woods Publishing's copyright and contract claims against Audible and other audiobook distributors on Wednesday, holding that the parties' licensing agreement allowed them to distribute the publisher's works through their subscription-based streaming services.

  • February 19, 2025

    CBS Will Seek Trump's Financial Info In '60 Minutes' Discovery

    Attorneys for Paramount Global and CBS Broadcasting told a Texas federal judge Tuesday that if President Donald Trump's $10 billion lawsuit accusing the network of deceptively doctoring former Vice President Kamala Harris' "60 Minutes" interview goes to discovery, they will seek information about the president's personal financials.

  • February 19, 2025

    Full Fed. Circ. Stands By Reviving Crocs False Ad Case

    The full Federal Circuit on Tuesday declined to revisit a panel decision reviving false advertising claims against Crocs Inc. over its statement that its shoes were made with "patented, proprietary, and exclusive" materials that were not, in fact, patented.

Expert Analysis

  • Tracking The Slow Movement Of AI Copyright Cases

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    The tech community may be expecting a prompt resolution on whether products generated by artificial intelligence are a fair use of copyrighted works, but legal history shows that a response to this question — at the heart of over 30 pending cases — will take years, say attorneys at White & Case.

  • The EU Design System Changes US Cos. Need To Know About

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    With a number of major reforms to the European Union's design protection system set to take effect in the first half of 2025, U.S. companies need to stay informed about specific details to maintain effective intellectual property management in the EU market, say lawyers at Finnegan.

  • Curious Case Of FTC's Amicus Brief In Teva Fed. Circ. Appeal

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    Attorneys at BCLP explore the Federal Trade Commission's backing of Amneal's Orange Book-delisting efforts on Teva ahead of a key Federal Circuit hearing in a case between the two pharmaceutical companies, and wonder if the FTC amicus brief indicates a future trend, especially in the next administration.

  • E-Discovery Quarterly: Recent Rulings On Metadata

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    Several recent rulings reflect the competing considerations that arise when parties dispute the form of production for electronically stored information, underscoring that counsel must carefully consider how to produce and request reasonably usable data, say attorneys at Sidley.

  • When 'Patented' Goes Beyond Inventorship In False Ad Cases

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    The Federal Circuit's recent false advertising holding in Crocs v. Effervescent is significant because it offers a nuanced yet realistic understanding of what false claims about a product's status as "patented" can mean, say attorneys at McDermott.

  • The Fed. Circ. In October: Aetna And License-Term Review

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    The Federal Circuit's recent decision that Aetna's credit card licensing agreement with AlexSam did not give the insurer immunity from patent infringement claims serves to warn licensees to read their contracts carefully, say attorneys at Knobbe Martens.

  • Opinion

    PREVAIL Bill Is Another Misguided Attempt To Restrict PTAB

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    The decade-long campaign against the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office's Patent Trial and Appeal Board — currently focused on the PREVAIL Act that's slated for markup in the Senate — is not really about procedural issues, and it is not aimed at securing more accurate patentability decisions, says Clear IP's Joseph Matal, former acting director at the USPTO.

  • Striking A Balance Between AI Use And Attorney Well-Being

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    As the legal industry increasingly adopts generative artificial intelligence tools to boost efficiency, leaders must note the hidden costs of increased productivity, and work to protect attorneys’ well-being while unlocking AI’s full potential, says Ed Sohn at Factor.

  • Fleetwood Facts: Art Imitating Life, Or Infringing Copyright?

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    A new lawsuit in New York federal court over Broadway's "Stereophonic" play tests copyright's limits, as copyright law poses significant hurdles when it comes to real-life stories, and the line between fact and fiction isn't always clear-cut, says Aaron Moss at Greenberg Glusker.

  • Empathy In Mediation Offers A Soft Landing For Disputes

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    Experiencing a crash-landing on a recent flight underscored to me how much difference empathy makes in times of crisis or stress, including during mediation, says Eydith Kaufman at Alternative Resolution Centers.

  • Series

    Being An Artist Makes Me A Better Lawyer

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    My work as an artist has highlighted how using creativity and precision together — qualities that are equally essential in both art and law — not only improves outcomes, but also leads to more innovative and thoughtful work, says Sarah La Pearl at Segal McCambridge.

  • Reading Tea Leaves In Fed. Circ. Deep Dive On Review Scope

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    Roy Wepner at Kaplan Breyer investigates why a recent Federal Circuit opinion spent six pages explaining its unsurprising conclusion on proper scope of review — that no deference need be afforded to the trial court in a case dismissed for failure to state a claim.

  • Consider The Impact Of Election Stress On Potential Jurors

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    For at least the next few months, potential jurors may be working through anger and distrust stemming from the presidential election, and trial attorneys will need to assess whether those jurors are able to leave their political concerns at the door, says Ken Broda-Bahm at Persuasion Strategies.

  • How Judiciary Can Minimize AI Risks In Secondary Sources

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    Because courts’ standing orders on generative artificial intelligence and other safeguards do not address the risk of hallucinations in secondary source materials, the judiciary should consider enlisting legal publishers and database hosts to protect against AI-generated inaccuracies, say attorneys at Lankler Siffert & Wohl.

  • 3 Steps For Companies To Combat Task Scams

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    On the rise in the U.S., the task scam — when scammers offer a victim a fake work-from-home job — hurts impersonated businesses by tarnishing their name and brand, but companies have a few ways to fight back against these cons, says Chris Wlach at Huge.

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