Justia Intellectual Property Opinion Summaries

Apple sued Samsung, alleging infringement of Apple patents and dilution of Apple’s trade dress. Samsung counterclaimed, alleging infringement of its own patents. A jury returned a verdict substantially in Apple’s favor, finding that 26 Samsung smartphones and tablets infringed Apple patents and that six Samsung smartphones diluted Apple’s registered iPhone trade dress and unregistered iPhone 3G trade dress. The jury rejected Samsung’s infringement counterclaims and awarded Apple more than $1 billion. The district court set aside a portion of the damages award for certain products and scheduled a partial new trial on damages, but affirmed the jury’s liability findings. The court denied Apple’s request for a permanent injunction. The Federal Circuit affirmed the denial of injunctive relief with respect to design patents and trade dress, but vacated the denial with respect to Apple’s utility patents. The court noted that Samsung has stopped selling the products found to dilute trade dress, but that, with respect to the utility patents, the court must assess whether Apple’s evidence suffices to establish irreparable injury. View "Apple, Inv. v. Samsung Elecs. Co." on Justia Law

Starbucks filed suit against Black Bear claiming, among other things, trademark dilution in violation of the Federal Trademark Dilution Act (FTDA), 15 U.S.C. 1125(c), 1127. The district court denied Starbucks request for an injunction, concluding that Starbucks failed to prove that Black Bear's "Charbucks" marks at issue were likely to dilute Starbucks' famous "Starbucks" marks. The court concluded that the district court did not err in its factual findings that there was only a minimal degree of similarity between the Starbucks marks and the Charbucks marks and that Starbucks demonstrated only a weak association between the marks. Balancing the section 1125(c)(2)(B) factors and other facts that bear on a likelihood of dilution, the court agreed with the district court that Starbucks failed to show that Black Bear's use of its marks in commerce was likely to dilute the Starbucks marks. Accordingly, the court affirmed the judgment of the district court. View "Starbucks Corp. v. Wolfe's Borough Coffee, Inc." on Justia Law

Kraft sued Cracker Barrel Old Country Store for trademark infringement, Lanham Act, 15 U.S.C. 1051, and obtained a preliminary injunction against the sale of food products to grocery stores under the name Cracker Barrel, which is a registered trademark of Kraft. Kraft has been selling cheese in grocery stores under that name for more than 50 years. Kraft did not challenge CBOCS’s right to sell the products under the name Cracker Barrel in CBOCS’s restaurants, in its “country stores” that adjoin the restaurants, or by mail order or online. The Seventh Circuit affirmed, noting the similarity of the logos, the products, and of the channels of distribution. View "Kraft Foods Grp. Brands LLC v. Cracker Barrel Old Country Store, Inc." on Justia Law

This appeal stemmed from Seven Arts's attempts to establish ownership of copyrights in several motion pictures: "Rules of Engagement," "An American Rhapsody," and "Who is Cletis Tout?" Seven Arts filed suit against Paramount and Content Media for copyright infringement, a declaration of ownership rights, and an accounting, seeking a declaration that neither Content Media, nor its predecessors-in-interest, CanWest, was the owner or grantee of rights to the films. The action was filed over three years after Paramount plainly and expressly repudiated Seven Arts's copyright ownership by choosing to continue paying royalties to CanWest and Content Media, rather than to Seven Arts's predecessors. The court joined its sister circuits in holding that an untimely ownership claim will bar a claim for copyright infringement where the gravaman of the dispute was ownership, at least where, as here, the parties were in a close relationship. The court affirmed the judgment of the district court, concluding that the district court properly dismissed the suit because it was apparent from the complaint that Paramount clearly and expressly repudiated Seven Arts's ownership of the copyrights more than three years before Seven Arts brought suit. View "Seven Arts v. Content Media" on Justia Law

Bell appealed the vacatur of a default judgment as void in connection with the manufacture and marketing by Iran of a helicopter that resembled Bell's Jet Ranger 206 in appearance. The court concluded that Bell's interpretation of Rule 60(b)(4) was contrary to the court's precedent, as well as that of almost every other circuit court of appeals, all of which rejected a time limit that would bar Rule 60(b)(4) motions; because Iran never appeared in the district court proceeding resulting in the default judgment, the district court properly applied the traditional definition of voidness in granting Iran's Rule 60(b)(4) motion; and because Bell's evidence regarding the effect in the United States of Iran's commercial activities abroad was either too remote and attenuated to satisfy the direct effect requirement of the Foreign Sovereign Immunities Act (FSIA), 28 U.S.C. 1605(a)(2), or too speculative to be considered an effect at all, the district court did not err in ruling the commercial activity exception in the FSIA did not apply. Accordingly, the court affirmed the judgment of the district court. View "Bell Helicopter Textron, Inc., et al. v. Islamic Republic of Iran, et al." on Justia Law

ARRIS and SeaChange provide video-on-demand products and services. ARRIS owns the 804 patent, which discloses a media server capable of transmitting multimedia information over any network configuration in real time to a client that has requested the information, allowing a user to purchase videos that are then streamed to a device such as a television. ARRIS alleged infringement by SeaChange’s Interactive Television. A jury returned a verdict in ARRIS’s favor, finding willful infringement. The Federal Circuit affirmed the verdict and the district court’s decision to enhance the damages award. The district court then permanently enjoined SeaChange from selling products that infringe the 804 patent. SeaChange released a system that it claims is outside the scope of the 804 patent. The district court found that ARRIS failed to prove contempt by clear and convincing evidence. The Federal Circuit affirmed. View "nCUBE Corp. v. Seachange Int'l, Inc." on Justia Law

Swift, Schaltenbrand, and Siddle entered into an informal partnership arrangement to operate a mail-order pharmacy, divide the profits from that business, and eventually sell the book of customers to another pharmacy. After some initial success, the partners began taking profit distributions that far exceeded agreed‐upon percentages. Swift eventually filed lawsuits against Schaltenbrand and Siddle. The district court listened to 14 days of testimony before ruling against Swift on most of his claims. The court invalidated a copyright registration that Swift’s marketing company obtained for a logo used by the partnership, finding that Swift knowingly misrepresented a material fact in the application to register a copyright in the logo. The Seventh Circuit affirmed in part, agreeing that Swift failed to prove Schaltenbrand and Siddle breached their obligation to provide him with a share of profits. Swift waived fraud claims by declining to include them in the final pretrial order. The district court erred by invalidating the copyright registration without first consulting the Register of Copyrights as to the significance of the inaccurate information. The Copyright Act requires courts to perform this “curious procedure” before invalidating a registration based on a fraud on the Copyright Office.View "Swift v. Medicate Pharm., Inc." on Justia Law

Houston and the District of Columbia each sought to register an official seal as a trademark in connection with various governmental services, including commerce, tourism, business administration, and public utility services. The U.S. Patent and Trademark Office refused their applications, citing Section 2(b) of the Lanham Act, which prohibits registration of a proposed trademark that consists of or comprises the flag or coat of arms or other insignia of the United States, or of any state or municipality, or of any foreign nation, 15 U.S.C. 1052(b). The Trademark Trial and Appeal Board upheld the denials. The Federal Circuit affirmed, holding that the Board correctly interpreted Section 2. View "In re: City of Houston" on Justia Law

Anthony Lawrence Dash filed suit against Floyd Mayweather, Jr., Mayweather Promotions, Mayweather Promotions LLC, Philthy Rich Records, Inc., and World Wrestling Entertainment, Inc. (WWE), alleging that defendants violated his copyright by playing a variant of Dash's copyrighted music during Mayweather's entrance to two WWE events. On appeal, Dash challenged the district court's grant of summary judgment and its denial of reconsideration with respect to his entitlement to actual and profit damages under the Copyright Act, 17 U.S.C. 504(b). The court found that an expert's report's, (the Einhorn Report) estimation of Dash's lost licensing fee, without more, was too speculative to show that "a reasonable jury could return a verdict" in Dash's favor on his actual damages claim, and therefore, summary judgment was appropriate; even if the Einhorn Report had suggested or even expressly concluded that the use of Dash's beat at WWE events was of some value to defendants, summary judgment would still be appropriate because the evidence supporting such conclusion was overly speculative in light of the record before the court and, therefore, was insufficient to establish a genuine dispute regarding Dash's actual damages; and the district court properly granted defendant summary judgment on Dash's claim for profit damages because Dash provided the factfinder with no reasonable basis for concluding that the infringement contributed to defendants' profits. Accordingly, the court affirmed the judgment of the district court. View "Dash v. Mayweather, Jr." on Justia Law

Jin, a naturalized American citizen of Chinese origin, with a bachelor’s degree in physics from a Chinese university and master’s degrees in physics and computer science from American universities, was employed as a Motorola software engineer, 1998-2007. Her duties involved a cellular telecommunications system: Integrated Digital Enhanced Network (IDEN). While on medical leave in China, 2006-2007, she sought a job with a Chinese company, Sun Kaisens, which develops telecommunications technology for the Chinese armed forces. She returned to the U.S., bought a one‐way ticket to China on a plane scheduled to leave Chicago days later, then downloaded thousands of internal Motorola documents, stamped proprietary, disclosing details of IDEN, which she was carrying with $31,000 when stopped by Customs agents. She stated she intended to live in China and work for Sun Kaisens. She was convicted of theft of trade secrets, but acquitted of economic espionage, under the Economic Espionage Act, 18 U.S.C. 1831, 1832, and sentenced to 48 months in prison. The Seventh Circuit affirmed, rejecting arguments that what she stole was not a trade secret and that she neither intended nor knew that the theft would harm Motorola. The court characterized the sentence as lenient, given Jin’s egregious conduct, which included repeatedly lying to federal agents.p View "United States v. Jin" on Justia Law