The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit (CAFC) issued a precedential decision on Thursday vacating the Trademark Trial and Appeal Board’s (TTAB’s) denial of a petition to cancel a trademark for a medicated tea product to treat colic in babies. Naterra International, Inc. petitioned the TTAB to cancel the mark BABIES’ MAGIC TEA based on likely confusion in the market with its own registrations for the mark BABY MAGIC, which cover “numerous toiletry goods.” The Board found that Naterra failed to prove confusion under the 13 DuPont Factors.
Three law school faculty and students filed an amicus brief earlier this week urging the U.S. Supreme Court to reverse a trademark decision of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit regarding the legal standard for trademark confusion. The brief asks the Court to “end the contradiction and confusion” around the different approaches taken to the likelihood of confusion analysis by federal courts.
Fashion is a brand-driven industry, and few brands in the fashion space carry the same cachet as Chanel. But how much control do brands like Chanel have over merchants who resell name-brand items in the secondary market? The answer, according to a federal jury in the Southern District of New York, is “Quite a bit.” The jury awarded Chanel $4 million in statutory damages on Chanel’s claims of trademark infringement, false association, unfair competition, and false advertising related to What Goes Around Comes Around’s (WGACA) reselling and marketing of Chanel products. The plaintiffs prevailed on all claims.
The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit (CAFC) today denied Charles Bertini’s petition for a writ of mandamus asking the court to order the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO) to decide his trademark cancellation case against Apple, Inc. According to Bertini, the cancellation case has been in limbo at the Trademark Trial and Appeal Board (TTAB) for more than three years, “despite [the TTAB’s] policy and frequent public statements by top USPTO officials that it decides cases after trial in approximately ten weeks.” Furthermore, a Petition to the USPTO Director filed on May 4, 2023, has yet to be decided, “despite the fact that most Petitions to the Director are decided in approximately two months.”
The U.S. Supreme Court today denied certiorari to Diamond J Wholesale, LLC, who petitioned the Court in December 2023 to clarify how individual liability for willful trademark infringement by a corporation should be assessed. The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Eleventh Circuit in August 2023 backed a Georgia district court’s finding that Diamond and its owner, Raj Solomon, willfully infringed trademarks owned by Top Tobacco, L.P., Republic Technologies (NA), LLC, and Republic Tobacco, L.P. (Top Tobacco) for cigarette rolling papers. The ruling upheld an $11 million verdict in favor of the tobacco companies.