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Elon Musk's Terafab hits a roadblock before making a single chip, receives cease-and-desist order — firm files trademark lawsuit, has sold Tera-Fab-branded lithography tools for over a decade Tera-Fab wants its name back. In an unexpected turn of events, Terafab has faced an odd roadblock as a small U.S.-based company called Tera-Print sent a cease-and-desist letter to SpaceX and Tesla back in May to stop using the Terafab name. The company with tera-scale ambitions has run into a tabletop-sized problem because the Tera-Fab name has already been used for about a decade by Tera-Print, according to PCMag. As it turns out, Tera-Print sells tabletop-sized Tera-Fab-branded beam pen lithography (BPL) tools primarily aimed at bioengineering and prototyping of microfluidic devices and has used the brand for about a decade. The U.S. Department of Defense appears to be a client of Tera-print, which uses Tera-Fab. While Tera-print claims that the Terafab name could be confused with its Tera-Fab product family, Tesla, SpaceX, and SpaceXAI counter that the operations are fundamentally different: Terafab is set to produce chips in extremely high volumes to serve AI, automotive, robotics, and eventually (at least some) space applications, whereas Tera-print's Tera-Fab is a compact lithography tool that can be used for bioengineering or prototyping of electronic or optical devices. Formally, the trademark coverage puts both names into the same semiconductor technology bucket, albeit with different descriptions: - Tesla's Terafab covers 'custom manufacture of semiconductor chips, memory chips, integrated circuits, and wafers' (IC 040) as well as 'distribution services, namely, delivery of semiconductor chips, chip carriers, namely, semiconductor chip housings, memory chips, integrated circuits, semiconductors, and microchips' (IC 039). - Tera-print's Tera-Fab covers 'Polymer pen and beam pen lithography instruments in the nature of 3D micro-printers and 3D nano-scale printers' (IC 007); 'Polymer pen and beam pen lithography instruments in the nature of 2D micro-scale molecular and material printers and 2D nano-scale molecular and material printers' (IC 009), 'Light-directed photochemical synthesis tools; Industrial advanced materials synthesis tools; Advanced light projection systems; High precision force-feedback sample alignment modules; Environmental control sample chambers' (IC 009); as well as 'training services in the field of AI design and development, electronics, computer science, biology, and material science' (IC 042). The two companies reportedly entered settlement talks, which included an offer from Tesla, but Tera-Print alleges that Tesla expressed interest in continuing negotiations instead of taking the dispute to court. Tera-Print says it will now defend its registered trademark and argues that the companies operate in related fields, which could lead to confusion. Follow Tom's Hardware on Google News, or add us as a preferred source, to get our latest news, analysis, & reviews in your feeds. Get Tom's Hardware's best news and in-depth reviews, straight to your inbox. Anton Shilov is a contributing writer at Tom’s Hardware. Over the past couple of decades, he has covered everything from CPUs and GPUs to supercomputers and from modern process technologies and latest fab tools to high-tech industry trends. - A Stoner Things like this. Petty and ridiculous actions like this here and in patents is why I feel more and more towards the ending of intellectual property rights. I understand the use and worth of them. At the other end, they have been abused to such an extent to reduce growth than they are used to sustain growth.Reply - Zaranthos Terafab ≠ Tera-Fab. If that confuses you then you're probably not smart enough to be a customer of either company. Beyond that one is a building name and one is a product name. AI can't replace lawyers soon enough.Reply - COLGeek Reply Well, there is the whole AI making up laws thing.Zaranthos said:Terafab ≠ Tera-Fab. If that confuses you then you're probably not smart enough to be a customer of either company. Beyond that one is a building name and one is a product name. AI can't replace lawyers soon enough. This is hardly the first time a lawsuit has been filed for similar circumstances, and will not be the last. - DRagor Smart company led by intelligent man would simply change the name if the one they want is already taken. Alas billionaires have too much money and not enough common sense to come up with such simple solution.Reply - PEnns ReplyZaranthos said:Terafab ≠ Tera-Fab. If that confuses you then you're probably not smart enough to be a customer of either company. Beyond that one is a building name and one is a product name. AI can't replace lawyers soon enough. I see your point but that opens a huge highway for abuse. If we suddenly have new companies with names like: The For-D auto company, Toyo-Ta, Boe-ing Air, Exx-On Oil, Hon-Da cars, Chrysle-R, IB-M computers, Fo-X News, etc. I wonder how many of the "old" companies or the courts would agree with you!! I bet somebody would be upset about a new techie website called TomsHardwar-E.com....😊 - tricorn Reply So I'm sure that Tesla wouldn't mind if they changed their product name to Tesla-Fab, right?Zaranthos said:Terafab ≠ Tera-Fab. If that confuses you then you're probably not smart enough to be a customer of either company. Beyond that one is a building name and one is a product name. AI can't replace lawyers soon enough. Or maybe they could call it Twitter. - tricorn Reply Trademarks are not in the same category as patents and copyrights. There's a good reason you can't just open up your "Ronald McDonald's Brew and View" movie theater/bar, even if your name is actually Ronald McDonald.A Stoner said:Things like this. Petty and ridiculous actions like this here and in patents is why I feel more and more towards the ending of intellectual property rights. I understand the use and worth of them. At the other end, they have been abused to such an extent to reduce growth than they are used to sustain growth.
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