In Curver Luxembourg SARL v. Home Expressions Inc., case number 18-2214, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit recently held that the claim language of a design patent can limit its scope where the claim language supplies the only instance of an article of manufacture that appears nowhere in the figures.

Plaintiff Curver had asserted U.S. Design Patent No. D677,946 (’946 patent), entitled “Pattern for a Chair” and claiming an “ornamental design for a pattern for a chair.” Curver sued defendant Home Expressions alleging that Home Expressions made and sold baskets that incorporated Curver’s claimed
design pattern and thus infringed the ’946 patent. The design patent’s figures, however, merely illustrate the design pattern disembodied from any article of manufacture. Continue Reading Federal Circuit Holds That Claim Language Can Limit the Scope of a Design Patent

LinkedIn is a popular professional networking website with more than half a billion members. Many of its users, in an effort to enhance their networking capabilities, make their profile public and available to anyone to review their personal details such as their employment, education, skill sets and other personal information. Although LinkedIn disclaims any ownership of the information its users post, this information has enormous value in the online marketplace. Continue Reading LinkedIn Profiles and the Applicability of the Computer Fraud and Abuse Act

Landlords whose tenants sell counterfeit goods can be liable for trademark infringement if they have knowledge of the infringing acts or are willfully blind to the infringement.

In Luxottica Group v. Airport Mini Mall, LLC, 932 F.3d 1303 (11th Cir. August 2019), Oakley, Inc. and its parent Luxottica sued the owners of a shopping mall in Georgia for contributory trademark infringement under the Lanham Act (15 U.S.C. §1114).  Luxottica and Oakley make and sell high-end sunglasses under the Ray-Ban and Oakley trademarks.  Continue Reading Landlords – Watch out for Trademark-Infringing Tenants!

Have you ever driven away from your home and then had that irritating doubt in your mind as to whether you remembered to close your garage door? I know I have. No matter how hard I try to search my brain’s archives, I really don’t remember whether I closed the garage door even though I close it 99.9% of the time! In that moment, you wish there was a way to check that doesn’t require turning around and going back home to see if you really left the house wide open for anyone to walk in.

Well The Chamberlain Group, Inc. (“Chamberlain”) thought it had patented an invention that could help with this type of problem—a garage door opener that wirelessly transmits information such as whether the door is open or closed. See U.S. Patent No. 7,224,275 (the “’275 Patent”). Specifically, the patent “relates to an apparatus and method for communicating information about the status of a movable barrier, for example, a garage door.” Continue Reading Federal Circuit Invalidates Garage Door Opener Patent Because It Is an Abstract Idea

The USPTO recently refused legendary quarterback Tom Brady’s application to register the mark TOM TERRIFIC. If you’re like me, you’re wondering why Tom Brady would want to register such a trademark. Well, according to Brady, he wanted to obtain the rights to the mark to prevent people from referring to him by that nickname. But that response isn’t satisfactory for those of us who know about trademark law for a couple of reasons. Continue Reading The USPTO Denies Tom Brady’s Application to Register TOM TERRIFIC