• Posts Tagged ‘standing’

    The Standing of an Exclusive Trademark Licensee (or not)

    by  • July 6, 2020 • right of publicity, trademark • 0 Comments

    July 7, 2020: Updated to add footnote 2. Section 32 of the Lanham Act is for infringement of registered trademarks. The section says that the liability for infringement is to the “registrant.” That category undisputedly includes a successor-in-interest, such as an assignee. A minority of courts have also held that “registrant” encompasses an exclusive...

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    You Can’t Just “Re-Form” a Plaintiff

    by  • April 27, 2020 • patent • 0 Comments

    Here are the facts: Ness Stewart Irvine was a patentee. Irvine assigned his patents-in-suit to InterAD Technologies, LLC. InterAD assigned them to Zeroclick, LLC (“Zeroclick I”), the plaintiff, a Texas entity. Zeroclick I sued Apple for patent infringement. Erich Spangenberg, listed as the “governing person,” terminated the Zeroclick I entity.1 Non-party Granicus IP, LLC...

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    Waiving Ownership of the Registration

    by  • February 10, 2020 • trademark • 0 Comments

    Do you need to own a trademark to succeed in an infringement claim? Not necessarily. The plaintiff, I&I Hair Corporation, now owns the registration for the trademark EZBRAID. Except that it originally didn’t; the registration was owned by Eunja Son, a principal of the plaintiff. I&I Hair sued the defendant, Beauty Plus Trading Co.,...

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    When Is It a License?

    by  • August 20, 2018 • trademark • 0 Comments

    When reviewing a settlement agreement, I often ponder the parts where it says something like “Party B agrees not to infringe the trademark in the future.” The agreement doesn’t need it; whether you say it or not Party B isn’t allowed to break the law. I suppose adding the language gives you a breach...

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    The Devil Is In the Definitions

    by  • November 6, 2017 • patent • 0 Comments

    Plaintiff Janssen Biotech had a fundamental structural problem with an agreement. The document was called an “Employee Secrecy Agreement,” but in addition to imposing duties of confidentiality on its employees the agreement also served as an employee invention assignment agreement, as is commonly, if not universally, done. Janssen’s structural problem was in the definition...

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    I Think This One Is Wrong

    by  • September 18, 2017 • trademark • 0 Comments

    Moreno v. Pro Boxing Supplies, Inc. is a precedential decision and, IMHO, clearly contrary to the Board’s controlling precedent. Opposer and petitioner Julie Moreno is the exclusive US licensee of the unregistered trademark CASANOVA for boxing equipment: Applicant and Registrant Pro Boxing Supplies is the owner of a registration for CASANOVA in standard character...

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    It’s The Details

    by  • August 28, 2017 • trademark • 0 Comments

    What a confusing ownership case (which perhaps means that the wise reader stops right here). Errors on every level, at the end of the day unrecoverable. The parties are Paradise Biryani, Inc. (PBI), Paradise Biryani Express, Inc. (Express), and Biryani Point Paradise LLC (PBB) on one side, and Paradise Hospitality Group, LLC (PHG) on...

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    What It Takes to Get Attorneys’ Fees

    by  • January 30, 2017 • patent • 0 Comments

    This is a bit of a “duh” case from the Federal Circuit, a nonprecedential decision. The only surprising part of it is that the trial court, Judge Sparks in the Western District of Texas, didn’t impose even greater sanctions. It was quite a show of generosity. The patent-in-suit has a short chain of title;...

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    Be Careful What You Wish For

    by  • January 23, 2017 • trademark • 0 Comments

    To “plead yourself out of court” is to state facts in a complaint that mean you have already lost. Something like, in a personal injury case, saying “I rear-ended him because he stopped at a red light” would do it. In Reynolds v. Banks it’s not quite exactly that, but pretty darn close. Sandra...

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