Worldwide: Intellectual Property

A company trying to register a trademark sometimes encounters an unusual situation: the owner of the trademark cited against its application does not object to the registration, but the United States Patent and Trademark Office still does.

The USPTO has released its latest economic impact report on IP-intensive industries, announced a new community engagement office in North Carolina, and issued several administrative updates including relief for Japanese applicants affected by a severe earthquake. The Patent Trial and Appeal Board has also designated new precedential and informative decisions addressing obviousness-type double patenting and Markush groupings.

Intellectual property due diligence often gets relegated to a final checklist item in acquisitions, but this approach can lead to costly oversights. Jason Balich explores why IP assessment should receive the same early, strategic attention as financial analysis, and provides a framework for evaluating whether a target company's patents, trademarks, and trade secrets are properly secured and enforceable.

Paul Bain has completed the second edition of Art Law: Cases and Controversies, a comprehensive legal guide published by LexisNexis that examines the intricate legal frameworks governing art creation, transactions, collecting, and preservation. The publication features contributions from leading professionals and addresses how traditional art law principles intersect with modern challenges posed by the Internet and artificial intelligence technologies.

Artificial intelligence has revolutionized innovation at unprecedented speed, but its rapid advancement raises critical questions about intellectual property rights. Is AI a transformative tool that lawfully builds on existing knowledge, or does it systematically infringe on the creative works and patents of inventors and artists? The answer depends on which side of this intensifying legal debate you occupy.

The U.S. government has filed a Statement of Interest of the United States of America under 28 U.S.C. § 517 in the Southern District of New York multidistrict litigation over OpenAI’s use of copyrighted works to train large language models. The filing appears to be the federal government’s first direct intervention in the wave of artificial intelligence (AI) training copyright cases, and it advises the court to treat model training (separate from use of AI to generate outputs) on copyrighted text standing alone as a highly transformative fair use under current law.

A company trying to register a trademark sometimes encounters an unusual situation: the owner of the trademark cited against its application does not object to the registration, but the United States Patent and Trademark Office still does.

Paul Bain has completed the second edition of Art Law: Cases and Controversies, a comprehensive legal guide published by LexisNexis that examines the intricate legal frameworks governing art creation, transactions, collecting, and preservation. The publication features contributions from leading professionals and addresses how traditional art law principles intersect with modern challenges posed by the Internet and artificial intelligence technologies.

Is this AI-generated, or is it real? As generative AI tools have become increasingly capable of creating realistic images, videos, and audio, they have also made it easier to impersonate real people without their consent. In response, states are increasingly adopting laws that impose civil and criminal liability for certain AI-generated content that replicates an individual’s identity, likeness, voice, or other personal attributes.

The Defend Trade Secrets Act marked its 10th anniversary in 2026, promising a unified national standard for trade secret protection. Has federal litigation delivered on this promise, or do state laws and circuit splits continue to fragment the landscape? This analysis examines key trends, unresolved legal questions, and emerging challenges posed by artificial intelligence in trade secret enforcement.

Explore how AI coding assistants face new security vulnerabilities, trade secret protection challenges in AI-driven businesses, and the evolving landscape of algorithmic pricing in retail. Discover insights on digital asset regulation, sports integrity cases, and the impact of AI on M&A due diligence.

As renewable energy companies race to innovate and scale, many are overlooking a critical vulnerability: inadequate intellectual property protection. Two experienced attorneys reveal the strategic steps technology-focused clean energy firms must take throughout product development to safeguard their competitive position, secure financing, and maximize value in future transactions.