“Mattel’s allegations that MGA instructed Mattel employees to steal documents is nonsense,” Isaac Larian, MGA’s founder and chief executive officer, said in an e-mailed statement. “To the contrary, we told them, in writing, don’t bring anything from Mattel, please. Not even a paper clip. We look forward to the judicial system to correct the wrongs Mattel has done to MGA over the years.”
Mattel Inc., the Barbie-doll maker whose $100 million verdict against MGA Entertainment Inc. was thrown out on appeal last year, 2010, is taking its fight over the origins of its rival’s Bratz dolls back before a jury.
Mattel may seek as much as $1.1 billion in damages for trade-secret theft, according to a court filing by closely held MGA. The judge, citing decision by the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit in San Francisco, ruled that Mattel could pursue copyright-infringement claims for only the first four Bratz dolls sold by MGA in 2001 and two later ones.
“Not only do the vast majority of the subsequent generations of Bratz dolls differ in their hair styles and fashions, the two elements identified by the Ninth Circuit, but they lack any meaningful similarities outside of ideas,” Carter said in his Dec. 27 ruling.
In his ruling, Carter rejected Mattel’s request to throw out MGA’s unfair-competition claims against it. MGA alleges that Mattel threatened licensees, distributors and retailers that did business with MGA and that Mattel attempted to deplete the supply of doll hair by buying excess quantities in an effort to crowd MGA out of the market.
“MGA has easily raised a triable issue about whether Mattel unfairly competed,” Carter said. “For example, Mattel may have routinely conditioned its contracts with retailers on the retailers not carrying MGA’s products, classic anti- competitive behavior that potentially deprived consumers of valuable products.”
Zeller said MGA’s unfair-competition claims are confused and wrong and that MGA admitted it suffered no damages.
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