Chinese AI company DeepSeek has been accused of IP theft, faced privacy inquiries in Europe, and has been the target of an enormous cyberattack. Now, it appears the company has a new headache on its hands: a U.S. trademark conflict.
On Tuesday, DeepSeek filed an application with the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO) seeking to trademark its AI chatbot apps, products, and tools. But it was a hair too late. Thirty-six hours earlier, another firm had filed for the trademark “DeepSeek”: a Delaware-based company going by the name “Delson Group Inc.”
Delson Group asserts that it has been selling DeepSeek-branded AI products since early 2020. In its application, the company lists its address as a home in Cupertino, and its CEO and founder as a person named Willie Lu.
Lu, who coincidentally graduated from the same university as DeepSeek founder Liang Wenfeng, Zhejiang University, claims on his LinkedIn profile to be a “semi-retired” consulting professor at Stanford and an FCC advisor. Lu seems to have spent most of his career in the wireless industry. Other web pages TechCrunch uncovered through the email address listed in the trademark filing mention Lu’s lectures and training courses on wireless standards.
Lu also hosts a “DeepSeek” educational course in Las Vegas on “AI Super-Intelligence,” starting at $800 a ticket — which features prominently on the website linked in Delson Group’s trademark filing. The website claims that Lu has “about 30 years’ expertise in ICT [information and communications technology] and AI fields.”
When reached for comment at the trademark filing email, Lu told TechCrunch that he would be willing to “meet and talk” in Palo Alto or Saratoga. (This reporter is based in NYC.) Lu didn’t respond to a follow-up request.
A search for “Delson Group” in the USPTO’s Trademark Trial and Appeal Board Inquiry System turns up more than two dozen disputes between Lu and organizations, including the GSMA, Tencent, and TracFone Wireless. Delson has abandoned some of the trademarks it filed for, or otherwise canceled its pending applications.
A broader search using the USPTO’s Trademark Search tool yields a list of 28 trademarks registered under Delson, a few of which are brands belonging to major Chinese companies. Delson has a trademark for “Geely,” for example, the Chinese automotive firm, and “China Mobile,” the Hong Kong-based telecommunications provider.
The pattern suggests a history of trademark squatting — registering a trademark with the intention of selling it later or riding on a brand’s popularity. In one of the best-known examples of trademark squatting, Chinese businessman Zhan Baosheng successfully trademarked the English name “Tesla” in China, as well as Tesla’s “T” logo, font, and Chinese transliterated name. (Baosheng later settled with Tesla for an undisclosed amount.)
Be that as it may, DeepSeek’s options are quite limited at this juncture. Under U.S. law, the very first user of a trademark is typically considered that trademark’s rightful owner, unless it can be proven that the trademark was registered in bad faith.
“While DeepSeek could potentially seek a coexistence agreement if they can prove they operate in different aspects of AI than Delson Group, the U.S. company has several advantages,” Josh Gerben, an attorney and the founder of Gerben IP, a law practice specializing in IP issues, told TechCrunch. “They filed first, they claim earlier use — 2020 versus DeepSeek’s claimed 2023 start date — [and] they have a live website showing AI-related activities, including training events.”
Gerben said that Delson Group might even be able to claim “reverse confusion” due to DeepSeek’s rapid rise to prominence, or sue to block DeepSeek from continuing to use its brand name in the U.S.
“DeepSeek may actually have a trademark problem in the United States where there could be this prior rights holder — Delson Group — and that prior rights holder may have a very good case for trademark infringement,” Gerben said.
It wouldn’t be the first time an AI company has run up against trademark headwinds.
OpenAI failed to trademark “GPT” last February after the USPTO ruled that the term was too generic. Over the past several months, OpenAI has also been fighting technologist and entrepreneur Guy Ravine for the right to use “Open AI,” which Ravine claims he pitched as a part of an “open source” AI vision around 2015 — OpenAI’s founding year.
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