We have passed the midpoint of 2025, and the landscape of intellectual property law continues to evolve at a rapid pace, shaped by emerging technologies, and shifting judicial interpretations. From pivotal Supreme Court decisions to high-stakes litigation in federal courts and beyond, the first half of 2025 has seen several landmark rulings that are poised to redefine boundaries in patent, copyright, and trademark law. This mid-year report highlights the top ten IP cases of the year, so far, selected for their legal significance, practical impact, and potential to influence future developments across industries. Together, these cases offer a compelling snapshot of where IP law is headed, and the challenges legal professionals must navigate in the months ahead.
- Patents
- Ingenico Inc. v. Ioengine, LLC, No. 23-1367 (Fed. Cir. May 7, 2025)
The Federal Circuit’s decision in Ingenico narrows the scope of IPR estoppel under 35 U.S.C. § 315(e)(2), resolving a longstanding split among district courts. Some courts had broadly interpreted estoppel to prevent petitioners from relying on physical device prior art in district court litigation if they had already raised or reasonably could have raised substantially similar patents or printed publications in an IPR proceeding. The Federal Circuit, however, clarified that “grounds” as used in 315(e)(2), refers to specific invalidity theories, such as anticipation or obviousness, not the specific prior art. Thus, a patent challenger can use the same prior art in both IPR and district court proceedings, as long as the prior art supports different legal theories (like public use or on-sale bar) that were unavailable in the IPR proceedings.
This ruling has broad implications. By allowing the possibility of patent challengers using the same evidence in multiple forums, the decision potentially lessens the strategic risks of initiating IPRs. The decision also curtails forum shopping by patent holders and may influence how district courts approach litigation stays pending IPRs. Furthermore, it could lead to increased use of discretionary denials at the PTAB due to the risk of duplicative litigation, especially in light of evolving standards around “Sotera stipulations” (wherein an IPR petitioner agrees not to raise invalidity grounds in a district court that were, or could have been, raised in the IPR proceeding to reduce the chances of a discretionary denial of the IPR petition under the Fintiv framework). In short, Ingenico reshapes patent litigation strategy by redefining the reach of IPR estoppel, urging patent challengers to reassess how and where to assert invalidity arguments.
- Ecofactor, Inc. v. Google, LLC, No. 23-1101 (Fed. Cir. May 21, 2025) (en banc)
In a significant ruling on damages, the Federal Circuit overturned a $20 million jury award in favor of EcoFactor against Google. Although a jury had previously found Google liable for infringing EcoFactor’s patents through its Nest thermostats, the en banc court determined that critical testimony from EcoFactor’s expert lacked a reliable factual foundation under Federal Rule of Evidence 702 and the Daubert standard. EcoFactor’s expert relied on past lump sum settlement licenses with third parties to assert an established per-unit royalty rate, but the court found those agreements, along with EcoFactor’s CEO’s testimony, insufficient to substantiate that such a rate had been accepted by the licensees.
The ruling underscores the heightened scrutiny expert testimony faces, especially when it comes to financial damages in patent cases. The court emphasized that EcoFactor’s analysis rested on the assumption that past licensees had agreed to a specific per-unit royalty rate, when in fact the agreements contained language explicitly disavowing such an interpretation. Moreover, EcoFactor’s expert lacked access to actual sales data to support his conclusions, relying instead on the assertions of EcoFactor’s CEO, who himself admitted to lacking concrete figures. Because the expert’s methodology depended on flawed or unsupported premises, the court concluded that the trial judge abused discretion by allowing the jury to hear his expert testimony. Consequently, the case was remanded for a new trial on damages.
Although the court reinstated other aspects of the prior panel ruling as to issues other than damages, it notably clarified the gatekeeping obligations of trial courts in assessing expert evidence. The majority’s decision sparked partial dissents from Judges Reyna and Stark, who contended that the expert’s testimony was sufficiently grounded and that any potential error was harmless given other corroborative evidence. Nevertheless, the holding signals a stricter threshold for admissibility of damages models, particularly those that extrapolate royalties from settlement agreements, reinforcing the principle that expert conclusions must rest on robust and verifiable factual underpinnings.
- iRhythm Technologies, Inc., v. Welch Allyn, Inc., IPR2025-00363, IPR2025-00374, IPR2025-00376, IPR2025-00377, IPR2025-00378 (P.T.A.B. June 6, 2025)
On June 6, USPTO Acting Director Coke Morgan Stewart denied institution of five IPRs filed by iRhythm Technologies against Welch Allyn, invoking discretionary denial authority under 35 U.S.C. § 314(a). Although multiple factors weighed against denial, including minimal litigation progress in district court and likelihood of a stay, Director Stewart introduced a new basis for discretionary denial: “settled expectations.” She emphasized that iRhythm had cited the challenged patent’s application as early as 2013 in an Information Disclosure Statement (“IDS”) during its own patent prosecution yet waited nearly a decade to file an IPR. This extended delay, despite early awareness, created an expectation of the patent’s validity that justified denial.
This ruling marks a significant development in the USPTO’s evolving approach to managing PTAB workload, as outlined in its March 2025 memorandum establishing a two-stage institution review process. The “settled expectations” factor has already been cited in subsequent decisions, reflecting its growing importance. The decision also signals a shift in strategy for both petitioners and patent owners: petitioners must now consider their historical interactions with the challenged patent, while patent owners can use evidence of long-standing awareness and inaction to argue for discretionary denial.
- Lashify, Inc. v. ITC, No. 23-1245 (Fed. Cir. March 5, 2025)
In a closely watched appeal, the Federal Circuit partially overturned a decision by the International Trade Commission (ITC), marking a significant development in the interpretation of domestic industry requirements under Section 337 of the Tariff Act of 1930. Lashify, a U.S. based beauty company known for its innovative eyelash extension products, alleged that various competitors were infringing its utility and design patents by importing and selling copycat products. Although the ITC had previously dismissed the complaint, citing Lashify’s failure to meet the economic prong of the domestic industry requirement, the Federal Circuit found the Commission’s legal interpretation of that requirement to be too narrow.
The court ruled that the ITC improperly excluded Lashify’s domestic expenditures on warehousing, distribution, quality control, sales, and marketing, holding that such activities, when representing significant employment of labor or capital, can indeed establish a qualifying domestic industry. However, the court upheld the ITC’s determination that Lashify’s own products did not meet the technical prong of the domestic industry requirement for its utility patent, due to insufficient evidence that its lash clusters were “heat fused” as required by the patent claims. As a result, the decision was affirmed in part and vacated in part. This ruling underscores the evolving standards for IP enforcement at the border and offers greater leeway for non-manufacturing IP holders seeking relief under Section 337.
- Copyrights and Artificial Intelligence (AI)
- Elliot McGucken v. Valnet, Inc., No. 24-1040 (9th Cir. Dec. 19, 2024) (cert. denied April 28, 2025)
Dr. Elliot McGucken had petitioned the Supreme Court to review the Ninth Circuit’s “Server Test,” a legal doctrine that determines when online content violates a copyright holder’s display rights under the Copyright Act. The case arose after Valnet embedded Dr. McGucken’s Instagram photos into online articles without storing them on its own servers. Because Valnet used embedding technology rather than direct hosting, the Ninth Circuit concluded there was no infringement under the Server Test, which holds that only parties who store and serve images from their own servers are liable for infringement. Dr. McGucken challenged this framework, asserting that the act of displaying copyrighted content, regardless of where it is hosted, should itself qualify as infringement if done without permission.
Despite these arguments, the Supreme Court denied Dr. McGucken’s petition for certiorari, choosing not to take up the case. This denial leaves the Server Test intact as binding precedent within the Ninth Circuit and preserves the status quo regarding the legality of embedding content from third-party servers. Although some district courts outside the Ninth Circuit have questioned or rejected the Server Test, no federal appellate court has openly opposed it, which likely influenced the Supreme Court’s decision to refrain from intervention. As a result, for now, the legal distinction between hosting and embedding remains crucial in determining copyright liability online, though the debate continues among courts and creators about whether this framework adequately protects copyright holders in a digital world.
- Thomson Reuters Enterprise Centre GMBH v. ROSS Intelligence Inc., No. 1:20-cv-613-SB (D. Del. Feb. 11, 2025)
On February 11, the District Court for the District of Delaware granted partial summary judgment in favor of Thomson Reuters in its copyright infringement suit against Ross Intelligence Inc. The case centers on Ross’s use of Westlaw headnotes and editorial content to train its legal research AI tool. Initially denied access to Westlaw’s proprietary content, Ross obtained legal training data through third-party vendor LegalEase, which used Westlaw headnotes as the basis for generating approximately 25,000 “Bulk Memos.” These memos, used to train Ross’s AI, allegedly copied protected elements of Westlaw’s content without permission. Judge Bibas, revising his 2023 summary judgment opinion, found that 2,243 headnotes were clearly copied and deemed Ross’s arguments of innocent infringement, copyright misuse, and other defenses unconvincing.
A key turning point in the court’s analysis was the recognition that Westlaw’s headnotes, though often derived from public judicial opinions, reflect sufficient editorial creativity to qualify for copyright protection. The court compared headnotes, Bulk Memo questions, and the corresponding case opinions side-by-side and concluded that Ross’s training data mirrored the headnotes more closely than the public domain content. Moreover, the court ruled against Ross’s claim of fair use, determining that Ross’s commercial use was not transformative, directly competed with Westlaw, and threatened potential markets for Thomson Reuters’s copyrighted materials. Although Ross prevailed on two fair use factors (nature of the work and amount used), these were outweighed by factors favoring Thomson Reuters (purpose and character of use and effect on work’s value or potential market). As a result, Ross’s motions for summary judgment on both copyright and fair use defenses were denied.
- Bartz v. Anthropic PBC, No. C 24-05417 WHA, 2025 WL 1741691 (N.D. Cal. June 23, 2025)
On June 23, the District Court for the Northern District of California issued a landmark decision addressing the fair use doctrine as applied to artificial intelligence (“AI”) training datasets. The plaintiff authors alleged that Anthropic infringed their copyrights by downloading pirated digital copies of their books and scanning purchased physical copies, all to build a vast central library for training large language models (“LLMs”), such as the AI software service Claude. Judge Alsup ruled that Anthropic’s use of books to train its AI was a fair use, emphasizing the transformative nature of training LLMs to generate new, non-infringing text. The court also deemed the digitization of lawfully purchased print books to be a fair use, citing space-saving and search-enhancing reasons. However, the retention and use of pirated digital copies were not protected under fair use, as such copying directly displaced the market for the original works and lacked transformative justification.
The court drew sharp distinctions among the types of copies and their purposes. Although copies used specifically for training LLMs were found to be transformative and did not substitute the original works in the market, the mere act of building a “general-purpose” digital library with pirated materials, even if later used for training, was not shielded by fair use. The opinion noted that even if such pirated books were never used or no longer used in training, Anthropic continued to retain them for potential future use. This possession of pirated materials, the court ruled, was unjustified and not excusable under copyright law. Accordingly, summary judgment was granted in Anthropic’s favor on fair use for training and print-to-digital conversions but denied for the use of pirated copies.
- Trademarks
- Dewberry Group, Inc., FKA Dewberry Capital Corp v. Dewberry Engineers Inc., No. 23-900, 604 U.S. (U.S. Feb. 26, 2025)
On February 26, the U.S. Supreme Court unanimously overturned a $43 million trademark infringement damages award, holding that under 15 U.S.C. § 1117(a) of the Lanham Act, a plaintiff may only recover the profits of the named defendant, not the profits of non-party affiliates, even if they are under common ownership. The ruling stemmed from a longstanding dispute between Dewberry Engineers and Dewberry Group over use of the “Dewberry” trademark. After an earlier settlement barred the Group from using the mark, the Engineers filed suit again in 2017 when the Group resumed using the name in conjunction with its affiliates. Although the affiliates were not parties to the suit, the lower courts included their profits in the damage’s calculation, treating the Group and affiliates as a single entity.
On appeal, the Engineers did not argue for veil-piercing but instead relied on a broader interpretation of § 1117(a)’s “just-sum” language to justify the inclusion of affiliate profits. The Supreme Court rejected that position, emphasizing the legal importance of corporate separateness. Writing for the Court, Justice Kagan clarified that “defendant’s profits” under the Lanham Act refers strictly to the profits of the named defendant. The Court vacated the damages award and remanded the case, directing a recalculation based solely on the Group’s profits. The decision underscores that plaintiffs must properly name all relevant parties if they wish to recover profits beyond those of the principal defendant.
- Yuga Labs v. Ryder Ripps and Jeremy Cahen, No. 24-879 (9th Circuit, July 23, 2025)
On July 23, the Ninth Circuit issued its opinion in Yuga Labs, which involved a dispute over nonfungible tokens (“NFTs”). Yuga Labs, creator of the Bored Ape Yacht Club (“BAYC”) NFT collection, sued artists Ryder Ripps and Jeremy Cahen for trademark infringement and cybersquatting, alleging that their nearly identical RR/BAYC NFT collection was meant to confuse consumers and capitalize on Yuga’s brand. The district court sided with Yuga, finding that NFTs can be trademarked under the Lanham Act, granting summary judgment on both claims, and awarding over $8 million in damages and injunctive relief. The court reasoned that NFTs, like other commercial goods, are sold in marketplaces and carry brand-identifying marks, even if they are intangible. However, on appeal, the Ninth Circuit reversed the summary judgment on the core claims. It held that while NFTs are indeed protectable under trademark law, there were factual disputes over whether RR/BAYC NFTs were likely to confuse consumers, particularly given the expressive, satirical nature of Ripps and Cahen’s project.
The Ninth Circuit emphasized that several factors, such as the similarity of the marks, the proximity of the goods, and the nature of online marketing channels, could not conclusively establish consumer confusion without a full trial. For instance, although the defendants used Yuga’s marks, they also openly criticized BAYC and marketed RR/BAYC as a form of protest art. The court rejected defendants’ arguments for “nominative fair use” and First Amendment protection but concluded that a jury must decide if the use of Yuga’s trademarks was confusing. It similarly reversed judgment on Yuga’s cybersquatting claim, finding that the domain names rrbayc.com and apemarket.com were not necessarily “confusingly similar” as a matter of law. However, the court upheld dismissal of the defendants’ counterclaims under the Digital Millennium Copyright Act (“DMCA”) and their requests for declaratory relief about copyright status, finding no genuine issue of fact and no jurisdictional basis, respectively.
In sum, the court confirmed that NFTs can enjoy trademark protection, clarifying a novel area of law. But it underscored that courts must tread carefully with emerging technologies and artistic expression, ruling that the case must proceed to trial to determine whether consumer confusion occurred in the NFT marketplace. The opinion balances modern IP enforcement with free speech concerns and reinforces the need for fact-intensive inquiry in internet-based trademark disputes.
- Reed v. Marshall et al., No. 24-20198 (Fifth Circuit July 2, 2025)
On July 2, the Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit affirmed a summary judgment ruling against Di Reed, a former member of the 1990s R&B group Jade, in her trademark dispute with fellow Jade members Joi Marshall and Tonya Harris, and their performance partner, Myracle Holloway. Reed alleged that Marshall and Harris infringed and diluted the JADE trademark by performing with Holloway under the group name without her consent. However, the court held that because all three women were co-owners of the federally registered JADE service mark, Reed could not sue them under the Lanham Act, which does not provide infringement or dilution claims between co-owners. It emphasized that co-owners, in the absence of a controlling agreement, each retain full rights to use the mark, including licensing it to others, as Marshall and Harris did with Holloway.
The court also rejected Reed’s unfair competition, false advertising, and false designation of origin claims. It found that her claims were premised on the mistaken idea that Marshall and Harris lacked the authority to use the JADE mark. Furthermore, Reed failed to provide evidence of commercial injury, such as lost sales or reputational harm, required at the summary judgment stage. Although she tried to introduce new evidence and challenge the district court’s procedures, the appellate court found no error in the lower court’s handling of summary judgment or in its decision to deny post-judgment relief. Ultimately, the court affirmed that the Lanham Act does not permit internal disputes among co-owners to be litigated as trademark violations, underscoring the need for formal agreements when multiple parties share a mark
- Conclusion
Looking ahead, as we move into the end of 2025 and start of 2026, companies would be well advised to reassess their IP portfolios, enforcement policies, and internal governance procedures considering these developments. Staying proactive, informed, and litigation-ready is not just a legal imperative, it’s a business advantage in an economy increasingly driven by intangible assets. Practitioners, rights holders, and innovators must remain agile, informed, and proactive. The remainder of 2025 promises further developments that may yet again rewrite the rules of engagement across all sectors touched by intellectual property.
