Tesla and SpaceX face trademark dispute over Terafab name

Elon Musk's semiconductor venture, Terafab, has entered a legal dispute regarding its name before beginning production. The U.S.-based nanotechnology company Tera-Print issued a cease-and-desist letter to Tesla and SpaceX in May, alleging that the Terafab name infringes upon its trademarked ‘Tera-Fab’ brand.

Tera-Print has utilized the ‘Tera-Fab’ brand for approximately a decade to market tabletop beam pen lithography (BPL) tools used in bioengineering and microfluidic prototyping. Following several rounds of unsuccessful negotiations between June and August, Tesla and SpaceX filed a lawsuit in the U.S. District Court for the Western District of Texas.

The plaintiffs are seeking a judicial ruling that Terafab does not infringe on the existing trademark. Tesla and SpaceX argue that Tera-Print's recent attempt to expand its trademark protection to include semiconductor products is speculative and that the two companies operate in sufficiently different product sectors to avoid consumer confusion.