Other Barks & Bites for Friday, August 26: CNIPA Announces 15% Increase in Patent Transfers and Licenses, Ninth Circuit Clarifies Secondary Meaning in Trade Dress, and Sixth Circuit Rejects ‘Derivative Sovereign Immunity’ Defense to Copyright Claims

This week in Other Barks & Bites: USPTO Director Vidal grants sua sponte review of IPR institution decisions to clarify the General Plastics factors; the Ninth Circuit rules that secondary meaning only needs to identify a single source, not a particular source, to support trade dress infringement claims; the Fifth Circuit affirms the dismissal of a trademark suit against merchandising agents for failure to join Jackson State University, which holds an interest in the underlying mark; font designer Nicky Laatz accuses Zazzle of exploiting the work of custom font designers without compensation; Fox Sports reaches a settlement over trademark claims filed by the entity owning the trademarks to the defunct USFL; China’s IP administration says that 2021 saw a 15 percent increase to the number of patent transfers and licenses within that country; and the Sixth Circuit rules that a defendant cannot claim a derivative sovereign immunity defense for committing copyright infringement in the course of bidding for state contracts.Read More