The case could test how broadly companies leveraging AI can claim trademark rights.
You launch your company on TryKepler.ai. Another startup later buys GetKepler.ai, a domain you had hoped to acquire after its previous owner shut down.
A conflict between these two companies is the crux of an interesting trademark dispute filed this week.
Internet Forest Corporation, doing business as New Generation, sued (pdf) Keru AI Inc. and its founders, Vinoo Ganesh and John McRaven.
The plaintiff operates a company that applies AI to e-commerce businesses using the domain TryKepler.ai.
Before that company launched, GetKepler.ai belonged to a bioinformatics startup that also used artificial intelligence. In March, that company announced it was winding down and posted a notice on its website saying it was moving on to a different business.
After seeing the notice, the plaintiff’s founder contacted one of the founders about buying the domain. The parties didn’t immediately reach an agreement.
When the plaintiff followed up in May, the founder replied:
“I think we already sold it to you!”
It hadn’t. It turns out they had sold it to a different company. The founder replied:
OK sorry, Someone else reached out to my colleague, and I just assumed it was the same company
thought it was unlikely that two companies would want our domain
The domain had actually been sold to Keru AI, which was rebranding as Kepler for its AI business currently targeted to the financial sector. In addition to acquiring GetKepler.ai, the company also now owns Kepler.ai, and GetKepler.ai forwards to that domain.
The plaintiff sent a cease and desist letter, alleging trademark infringement.
The defendant rejected the claim (pdf), arguing that the two businesses are completely different. It also said it has superior rights because it started to rebrand to Keppler before the plaintiff launched its business, and:
Keru has since acquired the domain and the former domain owner’s (Keplogic, Inc.) associated common law rights in KEPLER for AI software that date back to at least as early as April 2025.
The lawsuit disputes that assertion, questioning whether the acquisition included anything beyond the GetKepler.ai domain name itself.
Interestingly, the plaintiff cites the domain seller’s confusion as evidence of real-world confusion between the brands.
Another wrinkle stood out as I looked into the case.
The plaintiff never registered TryKepler.com, which remains available to register.
Meanwhile, GetKepler.com belongs to an entirely different company using the Kepler name.
Why is it so popular?
Johannes Kepler was a 17th-century German astronomer and mathematician famous for his Three Laws of Planetary Motion.
A Google search turns up many businesses using the name Kepler, such as kepler.gl, Kepler Group, and Kepler Space.
The case raises an interesting trademark question.
Many companies are applying artificial intelligence to different industries and problems. If lots of startups use AI for entirely different purposes, how broad should trademark rights for an AI brand be? Can a company claim exclusive rights to a name for “AI technology” generally, or should those rights be limited to the specific markets it serves?
“how broad should trademark rights for an AI brand be?” – The relevant inquiry is a factual one into whether consumers in the relevant market for the respective products are likely to be confused (which also subsumes the question of whether they are, or are not, in the same market involving the same consumers). The point about the domain seller not knowing the difference as evidence of “consumer confusion” is pretty stupid, though. The CEO of the former domain registrant is not a relevant consumer in the first place. Whether “random dude who is not a consumer of either parties services” is confused has nothing to do with anything. It’s like asking someone who never shops at Home Depot if they think “DELTA” faucets and “DELTA” table saws – both sold at Home Depot – are made by the same people. If you are not in the market for either a faucet or a table saw, your opinion is simply not relevant to the fact that you can find both of those unrelated “DELTA” brands under one roof at a home improvement store where nobody is confused by them.
A 3rd company affiliated with Anthropic is live on Kepler.ai. They may have something to say about all this legalistic maneuvering.
That’s the defendant — they forward getkepler.ai to kepler.ai. I don’t believe they are “affiliated” with Anthropic, but Anthropic featured them on its blog.
It’s also interesting that neither the plaintiff nor the defendant have registered TryKeplerAI.com or GetKeplerAI.com
And another company has a Kepler product in the AI space: https://www.gitkraken.com/kepler