Markenpod, Cologne (2026)

28/08/2026

A single TikTok video can now sell out a dupe product in hours. Sometimes before the original brand's own team even knows it exists.

That's the world trademark litigator Caitlin Byczko operates in every day. She's a partner at Barnes & Thornburg in Indianapolis, and on the new IP Fridays episode, she and Ken Suzan unpack a legal battleground most companies still underestimate: dupe culture.

A few things from the conversation that stuck with us.

Counterfeit and dupe are not the same thing legally, and most brands, and plenty of lawyers, still mix them up. Getting that distinction wrong changes your entire legal strategy.

Trade dress, not trademark, is usually the real weapon here. Byczko walks through why the Van Leeuwen v. Rebel Creamery ice cream case just handed brands a genuine roadmap for defining trade dress properly, and why the brands that win these cases defined their packaging with real precision, long before any dispute started.

Suing over a dupe can backfire in public faster than it wins in court. She treats enforcement as a communication decision first and a legal decision second, and explains why a quiet cease-and-desist often beats a headline-grabbing lawsuit.

The stat that surprised us most: searches for "craftsmanship" are at a 20-year high. After years of chasing the cheapest alternative, some consumers are swinging back the other way.

If your product has a distinctive shape, color, or packaging you've never formally protected, this episode is 25 minutes that could save you a very expensive mistake later.

Here is the full interview: https://www.ipfridays.com/

Has a dupe of your own product ever shown up online before you even heard about it?

28/08/2026

IP Fridays Podcast - Episode 178: Dupe Culture Is a Legal Problem Now: What Caitlin Byczko Taught Us About Trade Dress, TikTok, and the Limits of Brand Enforcement

28/08/2026

Ein Video auf TikTok, und ein Dupe-Produkt ist innerhalb weniger Stunden ausverkauft. Manchmal bevor das Original-Unternehmen überhaupt merkt, dass es kopiert wird.

Genau in dieser Welt bewegt sich Caitlin Byczko täglich. Sie ist Partnerin bei Barnes & Thornburg in Indianapolis und eine der gefragtesten Markenrechtlerinnen in den USA, wenn es um Dupes geht. In der neuen Folge von IP Fridays sprechen sie und Ken Suzan über ein Rechtsfeld, das viele Unternehmen noch immer unterschätzen: Dupe-Kultur.

Ein paar Punkte aus dem Gespräch, die hängen geblieben sind.

Dupe und Fälschung sind rechtlich zwei völlig verschiedene Dinge. Viele Unternehmen, und auch manche Anwälte, werfen das trotzdem in einen Topf. Wer den Unterschied nicht kennt, wählt die falsche Strategie.

Nicht die Marke ist meistens die entscheidende Waffe, sondern die Produktausstattung, in Deutschland am ehesten vergleichbar mit dem wettbewerbsrechtlichen Nachahmungsschutz und der dreidimensionalen Marke. Byczko erklärt am Fall Van Leeuwen gegen Rebel Creamery, warum Unternehmen, die ihre Verpackung von Anfang an präzise definieren, im Ernstfall deutlich bessere Karten haben.

Wer öffentlich gegen einen Dupe vorgeht, kann damit mehr verlieren als gewinnen. Byczko behandelt Durchsetzung erst als Kommunikationsfrage, dann als juristische. Eine leise Abmahnung schlägt oft die spektakuläre Klage.

Die Zahl, die uns am meisten überrascht hat: Die Suchanfragen nach "Craftsmanship", handwerklicher Qualität, sind so hoch wie seit 20 Jahren nicht mehr. Nach Jahren der Dupe-Euphorie wenden sich manche Konsumenten wieder dem Original zu.

Wenn Ihr Produkt eine unverwechselbare Form, Farbe oder Verpackung hat, die Sie noch nie rechtlich gesichert haben: Diese Folge dauert 25 Minuten und könnte Sie vor einem sehr teuren Fehler bewahren.

Hier ist das vollständige Interview: https://www.ipfridays.com/

Ist Ihnen schon einmal ein Dupe Ihres eigenen Produkts begegnet, bevor Sie selbst davon erfahren haben?

31/07/2026

IP Fridays Podcast - Episode 177: Long-Arm Jurisdiction in Europe - Interview With the Mastermind Behind the BSH v. Electrolux Decision of the ECJ Dr. Ernst-Peter Heilein - His View on Follow-Up Cases Like Fujifilm, Regeneron, and Onesta

https://www.ipfridays.com/

31/07/2026

Long-Arm Jurisdiction in Europa – Interview mit dem Kopf hinter der EuGH-Entscheidung BSH gegen Electrolux, Dr. Ernst-Peter Heilein – Seine Einschätzung zu Folgefällen wie Fujifilm, Regeneron und Onesta

Ein Staubsaugerpatent aus dem Jahr 2001 hat es bis vor die Große Kammer des Europäischen Gerichtshofs geschafft. Und dabei einen Managing IP Award gewonnen.

Für die IP Fridays Podcast Folge 177 habe ich mit Dr. Ernst-Peter Heilein gesprochen, dem Mann, der diesen Fall von der ersten strategischen Idee bis zum finalen Urteil begleitet hat. Was er mir erzählt hat, verändert, wie Sie über grenzüberschreitende Patentdurchsetzung nachdenken sollten, und wie über Ihr eigenes Risiko, wenn Ihr Unternehmen in mehr als einem Land tätig ist.

Das erwartet Sie in der Folge.

Warum sich BSH 2020 entschied, Electrolux in Schweden zu verklagen, nicht in Deutschland, gestützt auf eine einzige Regel in einer EU-Verordnung, die die meisten Patentanwälte für irrelevant hielten, sobald der Beklagte die Gültigkeit angreift.

Was tatsächlich passierte, als der Fall in Luxemburg landete. Drei Fragen. Eine, ob ein Heimatgericht seine Zuständigkeit verliert, sobald die Gültigkeit angegriffen wird. Eine zu Ländern, die Verletzung und Gültigkeit in getrennten Verfahren behandeln, Deutschland eingeschlossen. Und eine, ursprünglich zur Türkei, die inzwischen zu der Frage geworden ist, die sich in London und Washington alle stellen.

Warum der EuGH den Fall von einer Kammer mit sieben Richtern an die Große Kammer mit fünfzehn Richtern weitergereicht hat, und was diese Eskalation darüber sagt, wie ernst das Gericht die Sache nahm.

Die eigentliche Entscheidung, und die eine Unterscheidung, die in fast jeder Zusammenfassung dieses Falls falsch dargestellt wird. Heilein zieht eine klare Trennlinie zwischen einem europäischen Gericht, das einen Streit entscheidet, und einem europäischen Gericht, das ein ausländisches Patent für nichtig erklärt. Das ist nicht dasselbe, und der Unterschied zählt enorm für jeden, der in diesem Bereich berät.

Was long-arm jurisdiction für Patente außerhalb der EU tatsächlich bedeutet, und wie das eigene Heimatgericht eines deutschen Unternehmens plötzlich zum Schauplatz eines Streits um ein Patent aus einer völlig anderen Rechtsordnung werden kann.

Die drei Fälle, an denen diese Grenzen gerade in Echtzeit getestet werden. Ein UPC-Urteil zu UK-Patentrechten. Ein Münchener Gericht, das eine europaweite Unterlassungsverfügung erlässt. Und ein texanischer Bundesrichter, der eine Anti-Suit-Injunction gegen ein europäisches Unternehmen erlässt, das versucht, US-Patente in München durchzusetzen, ein Konflikt, der bis heute ungelöst ist.

Und Heileins eigene drei Lehren aus zwanzig Jahren in diesem einen Streit, die Art von praktischem Urteilsvermögen, die man nur bekommt, wenn man jede Phase selbst durchlebt hat.

Hier finden Sie das vollständige Interview in unserem Podcast IP Fridays:
https://www.ipfridays.com

26/06/2026

IP Fridays Podcast – Episode 176: Creator Economy Law: What Every Creator Needs to Know About AI, Platforms, and Their Rights – Interview with Franklin Graves of Linkedin

https://ipfridays.com

26/06/2026

Franklin Graves was in the room at the first White House creator economy conference. He also works at LinkedIn. He agreed to spend 30 minutes explaining what creators do not understand about their own legal rights.

You built the audience. The platform owns the relationship.

That's not an opinion. It's how the terms of service work on every major platform you use right now.

My co-host Ken Suzan had a conversation this week that I keep thinking about. Franklin Graves is Senior Product Counsel at LinkedIn, and he wrote the first law review article ever published specifically on creator economy law. He joined Ken Suzan on our podcast IP Fridays, and what he shared is something every creator, brand manager, and IP professional needs to hear.

Here are the four things that stuck with me most.

Your content is probably training an AI model right now. Whether you get compensated for that depends on four words buried in the terms of service you accepted without reading. Google is already doing this with YouTube. They are not hiding it. It is in the license grant.

The TikTok scare was a warning most people missed. When TikTok faced shutdown in the US, creators discovered overnight that their audience lived on someone else's property. Millions of followers, zero portability. The creators who were fine had built something the platform couldn't take away: a direct relationship outside of it. An email list. A newsletter. A community they actually owned.

Your voice is now an IP asset that needs legal protection. Tennessee passed the Elvis Act specifically to address AI voice cloning. Taylor Swift is filing trademarks on the sound of her own voice. This is not celebrity paranoia. It is the leading edge of a legal battle that will reach every creator who has ever published audio or video content. The law is still being written. The exploitation is already happening.

There is a legal difference between a creator and an influencer. Courts are only now starting to recognize it, and the distinction will determine who wins and who loses the IP disputes of the next decade. It comes down to intent, not follower count.

Franklin Graves spent years representing individual creators before moving in-house. He understands both sides of the platform relationship in a way very few lawyers do. His paper, Upload Complete, is the first serious academic attempt to give creator economy law a coherent framework.

The full conversation is in the latest episode of our podcast IP Fridays. You can listen to it on the website of IP Fridays and any other podcast player such as Apple podcasts, Spotify, Amazon Music, Google podcast, Youtube, ...

What would you do if the platform you rely on most disappeared tomorrow?

29/05/2026

Non-technical features back in the game for assessing inventive step? Is there an alternative to the problem solution approach?

The UK Supreme Court just rewrote the rules for AI patents.

In February 2025, it overturned the Aerotel test — which had been the standard in Britain since 2006 — and declared it "unsound law." The entire legal landscape for AI and software inventions changed overnight.

In episode 175 of IP Fridays, I spoke with Bruce Dearling, partner at Hepworth Brown. He wrote the original application, prosecuted it through every level of the British court system, and won at the Supreme Court. He probably knows more about this case than anyone alive.

Here is what struck me most.

The ruling introduced what is called the "intermediate step." Before assessing inventive step, an examiner must now look at how all the features in a claim interact — technical and non-technical alike. You can no longer just strike through a feature because it looks non-technical. If those features together produce a real technical effect, the claim stands. Bruce considers this far more important than the "any hardware" headline that most commentators focused on.

What makes this bigger than a UK story: the Unified Patent Court issued a decision in April 2025 — Abbott v. Sinocare — using language strikingly similar to the Supreme Court ruling. The UPC is not bound by UK courts. The overlap is not a coincidence. And Bruce told me, off the record, that people close to the EPO have spoken about converging UPC practice toward the UK Supreme Court approach. We may be watching a pan-European shift in real time.

The EPO itself is not there yet. COMVIK and the problem-solution approach are still the standard. Bruce's view: the problem-solution approach is structurally infected with hindsight reasoning. You formulate the objective technical problem by working backwards from a solution you already know. He has held this view for decades, and now the UK Supreme Court has said something similar.

Singapore's IP Office has already launched a public consultation asking whether the Emotional Perception ruling should be adopted into national law. That is Commonwealth-wide soft power from a single Supreme Court judgment.

Two practical takeaways for anyone prosecuting AI or software patents right now: make sure the claim contains hardware, and make sure the description fully explains what technical effect each piece of hardware or software achieves. Not as boilerplate — as a real technical account. Bruce is blunt: those who write the claim first and the description second run into trouble.

Full episode at the IP Fridays website and any podcast platform you can think of - Spotify, Amazon Music, Youtube, Apple Podcast, ... — worth your time if you work in patent prosecution, IP strategy, or tech.

01/05/2026

IP Fridays Podcast – Episode 174: Interview with Brian McGinnis – Data as a Strategic Asset, Not a Compliance Burden – AI Governance and the Acceptable Use Policy – Website Tracking Tools and the Wiretapping Litigation Wave

https://buff.ly/bNur5se

01/05/2026

Your company's data is either a managed asset or an unmanaged liability. There is no third option.

That is the opening argument Brian McGinnis makes in the latest episode of our podcast IP Fridays in this interview with Kenneth Suzan, co-host of this podcast — and everything that follows from it is worth hearing.

Brian is a partner at Barnes & Thornburg and one of the leading privacy and AI governance attorneys in the US. In our conversation, he covers ground that most legal podcasts never get close to:

Why your website is probably generating legal exposure right now — without anyone in your company knowing it. Why signing a vendor contract without a proper data processing agreement is the same as signing a bad IP license. Why the absence of an AI acceptable use policy is not a neutral position. And why the companies that treat compliance as a burden are leaving money on the table.

The parallel he draws between data governance and patent portfolio management alone is worth the listen.

Episode 174 of our podcast IP Fridays is live now. Listen to it wherever you listen to podcasts (e.g. Spotify, Youtube, Apple Podcasts, Amazon Music, the IP Fridays website, ...)

Markenpod

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