Welcome to the Snell & Wilmer intellectual property and technology litigation blog! Check here for useful news and information about patent, trademark, copyright, trade secret, and other IP and technology litigation developments.
On January 9, 2013, in Already LLC v. Nike, Inc., No. 11-982, 2013 WL 85300 (U.S. Jan. 9, 2013), the U.S. Supreme Court held that a broadly-crafted covenant not to enforce a trademark against a competitor’s existing products and any future “colorable imitations” moots the competitor’s counterclaim to have the trademark declared invalid. Noting that […]
Patents confer upon the owner of the patent the right to exclude others from making, using, offering for sale, selling or importing the invention for a set period of time. Tensions arise when patented technologies are included as part of industry technical standards, creating standard-essential patents that are required for system interoperability for certain technologies. […]
On September 13, 2012, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit, in 1st Media, LLC v. Electronic Arts, Inc., No. 2010-1435 (“1st Media”), reversed a Nevada district court’s ruling holding a patent owned by 1st Media unenforceable due to inequitable conduct. 1st Media, LLC v. do Pi Karaoke, Inc., No. 07-cv-1589 (Apr. 23, 2010). The opinion […]
On June 25, 2012, the Supreme Court granted certiorari in Already, LLC v. Nike, Inc., No. 11-982, on the issue of whether a federal district court is divested of Article III jurisdiction over a party’s challenge to the validity of a federally registered trademark if the registrant promises not to assert its mark against the […]
Trademark owners sometimes learn of potential infringers indirectly, such as when people mistakenly call or email the trademark owner when attempting to contact the infringer. Often, these confused calls come from the trademark owner’s own vendors or potential investors and strategic partners. While this “non-consumer confusion” is frequently just the first exposure to confusion in […]
June 13 marked “Reveal Day” — the day on which the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (“ICANN”) released the list of applied-for generic top-level domains (“gTLD”). These new gTLDs, which follow the “.” in a domain name, expand the number of available options beyond the familiar “.com,” “.org,” “.edu,” and other existing gTLDs. […]
In a decision that should give many employees a sigh of relief, the Ninth Circuit has held that browsing the Internet in contravention of an employer’s use restrictions does not give rise to criminal penalties under the Computer Fraud and Abuse Act (CFAA) 18 U.S.C. § 1030. In United States v. Nosal, No. 10-10038, 2012 […]
The Supreme Court has addressed the first question of patentability – whether the invention falls within the scope of patentable subject matter – for the second time in three years with its opinion in Mayo Collaborative Services, et al. v. Prometheus Laboratories, Inc., 566 U.S. ___ (2012). Through unanimous decision, the Supreme Court has provided […]
The movie and recording industries often resort to litigation in an effort to combat unauthorized distribution of copyrighted content on peer-to-peer networks. A federal district court in the District of Arizona has joined an increasing number of courts that reject efforts to group large numbers of unrelated defendants in a single case. In Third Degree […]
Last summer, we reported that the Ninth Circuit expanded the “effects test” of personal jurisdiction against foreign copyright infringers in Mavrix Photo v. Brand Technologies. As we noted then, the Mavrix Photo decision represented an expansion of the Ninth Circuit’s (seemingly ever-changing) willingness to permit its district courts to exercise jurisdiction over out-of-state defendants, holding […]