The US Supreme Court has declined to deal with the shoe patent dispute between Nike and German competitor Adidas. This decision followed Nike’s attempt to overturn a US Patent Office decision to invalidate a shoe patent.
The court documents show that Nike is challenging the court’s decision to invalidate the proposed replacement patent elements with arguments that Adidas did not present at the time.
This may have ended one of the longstanding disputes between the two sportswear giants. They have previously been at odds over various patents related to the design of knitted uppers.
In March 2008, Nike was first granted a patent giving the company ownership of a textile component made from "different mesh configurations with different textures" consists and is produced by knitting processes.
While Adidas then requested a review of the patent, Nike filed a request to amend the patent by overturning previous claims and proposing replacement claims, one of which Adidas rejected, claiming that they were still unpatentable.
The dispute was then brought before the United States Circuit Court of Appeals, which remanded the case back to the chamber twice and last year dismissed a third appeal by Nike, prompting the brand to petition the Supreme Court.
Nike originally filed its lawsuit in December 2021, alleging that Adidas was infringing on several of its footwear patents, most notably its Flyknit technology.
Adidas then filed a counterclaim against Nike, claiming the company had "knowingly and intentionally" infringed nine patents of its own sports technology, specifically relating to Nike’s Run Club app.
This translated post previously appeared on FashionUnited.com