How Does the Initial Interest Confusion Doctrine Improve Trademark Analyses?–Dassault v. Childress

These parties have been fighting with each other since at least 2009. This case had a trial in 2017 and ruled for the defense. In 2020, the Sixth Circuit remanded the case for a new trial, which occurred in March 2024. The 2024 jury ruled for the trademark owner on the prima facie case and for the defense on trademark fair use, giving the win to the defense. The judge overturned the jury’s conclusion on trademark fair use, handing the win to the plaintiff. I smell another appeal coming. The court now follows up the plaintiff win with a permanent injunction.

Trying to salvage its jury win, the defense challenges the jury’s finding of confusion. The defense argued that the 2024 jury’s likelihood of consumer confusion finding could have only been based on the initial interest confusion doctrine. The defense further argued that the 6th Circuit, in its 2020 ruling this case, rejected the doctrine. The court responds:

The Sixth Circuit did not squarely decide in its 2020 ruling that Dassault’s initial interest confusion theory failed as a matter of law. Indeed, that issue was not even presented to the Sixth Circuit.

The court has this to say about the 2020 Sixth Circuit opinion:

Dassault contended that Childress’ use of the CATIA mark created initial interest confusion as a matter of law. The Sixth Circuit disagreed with that contention. It held that the jury reasonably could have rejected Dassault’s initial interest confusion theory and reasonably have found that Childress’ use of the CATIA mark was “unlikely to cause confusion.”…

The Sixth Circuit was not asked to decide, and did not decide, whether Dassault’s evidence of likelihood of confusion – including its evidence of initial interest confusion – was so weak as to compel judgment in Childress’ favor. Simply put, the Sixth Circuit did not squarely decide that Dassault’s initial interest confusion theory failed as a matter of law…

To be sure, as Childress highlights, the Sixth Circuit was somewhat critical of Dassault’s initial interest confusion theory. But the Sixth Circuit offered those comments in the course of explaining its holding that Dassault was not entitled to judgment in its favor on that theory.

Here’s what the Sixth Circuit said about the initial interest confusion doctrine in its 2020 opinion:

Dassault argues that Childress’s “practicalcatia” domain name would appear whenever someone searched “CATIA” in Google. Before clicking on the link, Dassault argues, a consumer would not see the webpage’s identifying information that clarifies it is not affiliated with Dassault. Dassault characterizes this as a type of “initial interest” confusion that supports infringement.

Dassault’s argument is unavailing. “Simply invoking the term ‘initial-interest confusion’ does not state a viable claim,” let alone warrant judgment as a matter of law. Dassault fails to “explain why, assuming that such initial confusion were to take place, it would not be instantly dissipated without any harm” once the consumer clicks the www.practicalcatia.com link and enters the website—a website with numerous indicators that clarify it is not affiliated with Dassault. Moreover, when www.practicalcatia.com is displayed in Google’s search results, Childress suggests that even the preview of the site displays the disclaimer: “CATIA is a registered trademark of Dassault Systèmes and has no affiliation with Practical Catia Training.”

If the principal source of purported consumer confusion is that the domain name shows up in inscrutable search results that link to a website with ample disclaimers, the Fourth Circuit (per Lamparello) would decisively say any confusion about the domain name must be evaluated in combination with the (disclaimered) website. If the Sixth Circuit follow the Fourth Circuit’s lead on this point, then how can there be any initial interest confusion? (The Lamparello case has been good law in the Fourth Circuit and beyond for 20 years).

That leaves me to wonder what value the initial interest confusion doctrine is adding to this case. I didn’t sort through the nearly 20 years of filings to figure out if there were other facts that could have caused “initial interest” confusion, but precision about those facts matters a lot. Based on this 2026 opinion, I can’t see any aspect of the court’s analyses that was enhanced by the “initial interest confusion” doctrine.

Case Citation: Dassault Systemes, S.A. v. Childress, 2026 WL 323779 (E.D. Mich. Feb. 6, 2026). The GovInfo page.