On Wednesday, Apple Inc convinced a California federal judge to abandon a lawsuit claiming the tech giant copied another company’s racially diverse emoji and violated its intellectual property rights.
However, US District Judge Vince Chhabria said Cub Club Investment LLC failed to demonstrate that Apple had copied anything that was eligible for copyright protection.
Cub Club’s 2020 lawsuit said its founder Katrina Parrott created and launched the “iDiversicons” app in 2013 and claims it was the first racially diverse emoji in the world.
The company also claims that Parrot discussed a potential partnership with Apple in 2014 and that, after declining to collaborate with her, the tech giant went on to create its own set of racially diverse emojis. Cub Club says Apple’s emoji infringed its copyright and trademark rights.
The Texas-based company has been given the opportunity to amend its lawsuit, though Judge Chhabria said he was sceptical that it could succeed due to numerous differences between Apple’s emoji design and its own.
