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March 23, 2026
WASHINGTON, D.C. — The U.S. Supreme Court on March 23 granted the U.S. government’s motion to participate in oral arguments when it considers the standard for the inducement of infringement to be applied in medical patent cases, including in “skinny label cases” involving allegedly noninfringing use; on March 20, the patent-holding biopharmaceutical entities filed their merits brief, arguing that statements made by a bioequivalent maker plausibly allege induced infringement.
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March 23, 2026
WASHINGTON, D.C. — A Federal Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals panel found errors in a Maryland federal judge’s construction of disputed patent claims in a suit over patents covering atomizers for particulate paints, which led the panel in its March 20 opinion to reverse the judge’s grant of summary judgment of noninfringement in the defendant-appellee’s favor.
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March 20, 2026
WASHINGTON, D.C. — The U.S. International Trade Commission (ITC) did not err when it held that Apple Inc. violated the Tariff Act by importing and selling Apple Watch models that infringed blood oxygenation patents held by other technology entities, a Federal Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals panel held March 19.
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March 20, 2026
DENVER — A federal magistrate judge in Colorado granted a motion for summary judgment filed by the American organization for worshippers in the Bahá’í faith on trademark claims against an individual the organization says is using marks in connection with one of the religion’s governing bodies; the judge agreed with the plaintiff religious organization that the outcome of the trademark claims was determined by the defendant’s loss before the U.S. Trademark Trial and Appeal Board (TTAB).
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March 20, 2026
WASHINGTON, D.C. — The U.S. International Trade Commission (ITC) reversed a finding from an administrative law judge (ALJ) that certain tobacco product entities violated federal importation laws by importing vaping products that infringed a patent held by R.J. Reynolds Vapor Co. and related entities; the ITC determined that there was no violation because multiple claims of the patent at issue are invalid as obvious.
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March 19, 2026
NEW YORK — Whether media companies’ allegation that OpenAI entities downloaded content and removed copyright management information from works used to train artificial intelligence suffices as an injury or whether copyright law requires something more came before the Second Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals during oral arguments on March 18.
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March 18, 2026
PASADENA, Calif. — A Ninth Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals panel affirmed a California federal judge’s dismissal of a trademark infringement dispute that a California-based beverage store brought against a similarly named wine shop in New York, agreeing in a March 17 unpublished memorandum disposition that the plaintiff-appellant shop and its owner had failed to establish personal jurisdiction over the New York store.
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March 18, 2026
SAN FRANCISCO — A California federal judge was right to dismiss an actor’s trademark infringement claims against Tyler Perry Studios (TPS) film studio for lack of personal jurisdiction, a Ninth Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals panel held, affirming the district court’s rejection of claims that Perry wrongly distributed a recording of a performance of “Diary of a Mad Black Woman” before the play was adapted into a successful film.
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March 18, 2026
NEW YORK — A romance author who claimed that another author and publishing industry entities copied the premise of her unpublished “romantasy” novel to form the basis of a bestselling novel series cannot show substantial similarity between the works, a New York federal judge found.
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March 17, 2026
WASHINGTON, D.C. — A technology company lacked constitutional standing to bring patent infringement claims against another technology company because a 2006 agreement transferred all rights associated with the patents at issue to a third party, a Federal Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals panel held March 16 in agreeing with a Nevada federal judge.
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March 17, 2026
CLEVELAND — An Ohio federal judge denied a nonprofit birthing advocacy group’s motion to dismiss its founder’s complaint that the organization used copyrights and trademarks created by the founder without authorization; the judge held that the plaintiff adequately alleged copyright and trademark infringement for the purpose of surviving dismissal.
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March 16, 2026
MONTGOMERY, Ala. — A federal judge in Alabama on March 13 granted a cancer advocacy group’s motion for a temporary restraining order against the former president of its board of directors and the company she controls, enjoining the defendants from using trademarks related to the phrase “Women in Blue” in connection with a fundraising initiative.
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March 16, 2026
CHICAGO — A federal judge in Illinois dismissed a video conferencing company’s patent infringement complaint against another technology company, holding that the asserted patent claims were invalid as abstract because they were directed at the abstract concept of verifying a user’s identity and relaying the identification information elsewhere.
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March 13, 2026
NEW YORK — A Second Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals panel saw no abuse of discretion in a New York federal judge’s finding that the owner of a South Asian film festival in New York was unlikely to succeed on trademark claims against the owner of a South Asian film festival in both Texas and New York, affirming the judge’s decision to deny a preliminary injunction.
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March 13, 2026
WASHINGTON, D.C. — In an amicus curiae brief filed in support of neither party, the Intellectual Property Owners Association (IPO) told the U.S. Supreme Court that the standard for inducement of infringement should be applied universally in patent cases, including in “skinny label” cases involving an allegedly noninfringing use; IPO tells the high court that the petitioner bioequivalent pharmaceutical maker appears to be advocating for multiple “bright-line” rules that should not be applied.
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March 13, 2026
SAN FRANCISCO — An Arizona federal judge was not wrong to deny a plaintiff web development entity’s request for attorney fees from its domain registrar, a Ninth Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals panel held, finding that it was not unreasonable for the domain registrar to seek federal question jurisdiction on claims that it improperly blocked its use of a domain name in the United States as a result of an order from a judge in India regarding specific trademarks.
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March 13, 2026
WASHINGTON, D.C. — In a pair of opinions, a Federal Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals panel vacated a judgment of infringement against the makers of the Norton antivirus software, holding that a Virginia federal judge wrongly held that the patents at issue are not directed at an abstract idea; the panel also reversed the judge’s entry of sanctions against the software company’s counsel at Quinn Emanuel Urquhart & Sullivan LLP for failing to comply with an order compelling it to disclose allegedly privileged information it received from a former employee of the software company the firm also represented.
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March 13, 2026
WASHINGTON, D.C. — A partly split Federal Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals panel agreed with the U.S. Patent Trial and Appeal Board (PTAB) that Apple Inc. had failed to prove a motivation to combine certain prior art references or that another combination had a reasonable likelihood of being successful in the latest appeal involving another technology company.
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March 12, 2026
WASHINGTON, D.C. — A Federal Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals panel on March 11 reversed an Iowa federal judge’s finding that claims of a patent describing a type of crop harvesting tool were invalid as indefinite; the panel held that the patent specification’s reference to a commercially available controller with logic circuitry constituted sufficient corresponding structure without the disclosure of an algorithm.
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March 12, 2026
SAN FRANCISCO — A federal judge in California vacated a scheduled hearing on a motion to dismiss direct copyright infringement claims against MosaicML Inc. and Databricks Inc. and will decide the motion on the briefs in litigation over the alleged use of copyrighted works to train artificial intelligence models (In re Mosaic LLM Litigation, No. 24-1451, N.D. Calif.).
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March 12, 2026
CHICAGO — A Seventh Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals panel found that an Illinois federal judge “clearly erred” by determining that defendants in a counterfeiting case sold products in Illinois based on screenshots showing an uncompleted purchase to a Chicago shipping address.
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March 11, 2026
WASHINGTON, D.C. — A Federal Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals panel reversed a Texas federal judge’s decision to exclude a plaintiff technology company’s expert on damages and vacated the judge’s grant of summary judgment for absence of remedy in Microsoft Corp.’s favor on infringement claims involving patents describing a method for communication between virtual networks.
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March 11, 2026
WASHINGTON, D.C. — A Federal Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals panel affirmed a finding from the U.S. Patent Trial and Appeal Board (PTAB) that a pending claim in an application for a patent on a type of cleated shoe was invalid as obvious per a combination of prior art references.
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March 10, 2026
WASHINGTON, D.C. — A Federal Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals panel on March 9 affirmed final written decisions by the U.S. Patent Trial and Appeal Board (PTAB), holding that the board did not abuse its discretion when it held that a technology company forfeited a new antedating argument during inter partes review (IPR) proceedings.
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March 09, 2026
WASHINGTON, D.C. — The U.S. Supreme Court denied a pro-Zionist advocacy group’s petition for a writ of certiorari in a March 9 order list, declining to hear the advocacy group’s contention that the Second Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals violated the core principles of trademark law when a panel determined that the group and another with similar aims are co-owners of the trademark “Zioness.”