When former mattel employee left the company and created the most serious threat barbie has ever faced Mattel was not going to sit back and do nothing seeing that the designer was still being employed by Mattel at the time of the design. Mattel pressed on to sue the former employee as they felt entitled to the profits.
1.) From that point on it went from bad to worse to farcical. At one point, the court ordered MGA to turn over all future plans for the Bratz line, which was then reversed, which was reversed by a lower court, which was re-reversed by the original court. This led to counterclaims flying from both directions and the last we had heard, Mattel, which had originally filed the suit, was being hit with a judgment for $309 million in damages, including MGA's court fees. Adding that together with Mattel's legal expenses, and this fight over dolls put Mattel on the hook for nearly $700 million.
8 years later the courts finally reaches the following conclusion that many view only profitable for the lawyers:
2.) The long-running IP war between Mattel Inc. and MGA Entertainment Inc. over the Bratz line of dolls has ended — for now — with zero damages.
The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit on Thursday laid waste to Bratz maker MGA's $170 million trade secret award — an award procured on retrial after the appeals court wiped out Barbie maker Mattel's $100 million copyright verdict and constructive trust.
But MGA gets the last laugh. The Ninth Circuit left untouched $137 million in attorney fees and costs awarded to MGA for defending against Mattel's copyright claims.
Although MGA wont be collecting any additional damages but their legal team will live on to fight another day. CEO Isaac Larian promised to retry the company's trade secret claims to a new jury. Larian sourly quotes the following:
3.)"We are confident that when the second jury hears about Mattel's sneaking into our showrooms and egregious theft of scores of our secrets over the years, they will be even more appalled than the first jury and award MGA even greater damages," he said in the statement.
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