Supreme Court of the United States · 2001-03-20
Case and law context
Role: applied; posture: Supreme Court reviews reversal of summary judgment against trade-dress claimant; restores functionality bar and remands; separate trademark-name judgment not before Court.; result: claimant-lost; claim:
Instances and excluded annotation blocks
| Case | Element | Holding and scope | Variant | Exact source quotations |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| /us/532/0023-01 — Supreme Court of the United States · 2001 | Claimant proves nonfunctionality | not Counted merits instance applied / merits basis: no-evidence; theory: Functional design claimed in expired utility patents; subject: theory=Functional design claimed in expired utility patents No-evidence reflects inability to overcome functionality on the summary-judgment record, reinforced by a legal evidentiary rule. The Court does not create an absolute patent-expiration bar for ornamental features; cany is preserved OCR. | utility-patent/dual-spring-road-sign | A utility patent is strong evidence that the features therein claimed are functional.Source: docroot/ir/caselaw/us_532.jsonl#/us/532/0023-01; Unicode character offsets [8727:8812] (end exclusive); SHA-256 e20ddab45d1c903de6daba9faefb48543deb0cd6d8418cfcb001b3aa2096317c.The dual-spring design serves the important purpose of keeping the sign upright even in heavy wind conditions; and, as confirmed by the statements in the expired patents, it does so in a unique and useful manner.Source: docroot/ir/caselaw/us_532.jsonl#/us/532/0023-01; Unicode character offsets [11915:12127] (end exclusive); SHA-256 e20ddab45d1c903de6daba9faefb48543deb0cd6d8418cfcb001b3aa2096317c.The dual-spring design affects the cost of the device as well; it was acknowledged that the device “could use three springs but this would unnecessarily increase the cost of the device.”Source: docroot/ir/caselaw/us_532.jsonl#/us/532/0023-01; Unicode character offsets [13171:13357] (end exclusive); SHA-256 e20ddab45d1c903de6daba9faefb48543deb0cd6d8418cfcb001b3aa2096317c.MDI has pointed to nothing arbitrary about the components of its device or the way they are assembled.Source: docroot/ir/caselaw/us_532.jsonl#/us/532/0023-01; Unicode character offsets [18959:19061] (end exclusive); SHA-256 e20ddab45d1c903de6daba9faefb48543deb0cd6d8418cfcb001b3aa2096317c.The rule we have explained bars the trade dress claim, for MDI did not, and cannot, cany the burden of overcoming the strong evidentiary inference of functionality based on the disclosure of the dual-spring design in the claims of the expired patents.Source: docroot/ir/caselaw/us_532.jsonl#/us/532/0023-01; Unicode character offsets [9620:9871] (end exclusive); SHA-256 e20ddab45d1c903de6daba9faefb48543deb0cd6d8418cfcb001b3aa2096317c. |
| /us/532/0023-01 — Supreme Court of the United States · 2001 | Enforceable source-identifying mark or trade dress | not_reached Excluded from merits counts applied / merits theory: Source recognition does not cure functionality; subject: theory=Source recognition does not cure functionality Secondary meaning not resolved by this Court; the lower court decisions on it are not imported as appellate merits findings. | secondary-meaning/functional-design | Functionality having been established, whether MDI’s dual-spring design has acquired secondary meaning need not be considered.Source: docroot/ir/caselaw/us_532.jsonl#/us/532/0023-01; Unicode character offsets [16826:16952] (end exclusive); SHA-256 e20ddab45d1c903de6daba9faefb48543deb0cd6d8418cfcb001b3aa2096317c. |