Courtland Merrill is a Partner with Saul Ewing. Courtland represents businesses across the country in intellectual property disputes, including enforcement of patents and IP rights in trials and appeals. His patent litigation experience includes handling claims of willful patent infringement under the doctrine of equivalents, an area of his work that won him recognition by Law360 as a “Legal Lion” following a $1.85 million verdict for a manufacturing client. Courtland defends patents challenged in the inter partes review process before the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office. He also helps companies protect their intellectual property rights with claims alleging theft of trade secrets and enforcement of non-compete agreements and contracts. He represents medical device manufacturers, makers of consumer products and technology manufacturers, among many other types of clients.
The purpose behind the prohibition of functional trademarks is so that the trademark holder does not unfairly stifle legitimate competition by precluding its competitors from using functional aspects of that product in their own, competing products…. Trademark owners nonetheless can still protect non-functional aspects of products also covered by a utility patent, at least for the time being. The Supreme Court in TrafFix did not foreclose the possibility that ornamental or arbitrary elements of a product features could constitute protectable trade dress despite concurrent utility patent protection. Recent cases show some successes by trademark plaintiffs stating claims for trade dress infringement despite their product being disclosed in a utility patent, at least at the pleadings stage.