Pretzel Company’s Owners Allege Tax Lawyer Got Lost in Twists of IP Law

“In October 2006, Pepperidge Farms and Snack Factory entered
into a product development agreement that the Wilsons call
one-sided. They say it gave Pepperidge the right to patent pretzel
crackers that were slight variations on products made with Snack
Factory’s intellectual property, and provided Snack Factory no
“meaningful” compensation for the use of its intellectual
property.

“In September 2007, Snack Factory, Baptista’s and Pepperidge
Farms entered into a manufacturing agreement that the Wilsons call
ambiguous about channels of distribution, pricing and development
of new product lines. “No reasonable counsel would have advised a
similarly situated client to accept the agreement. To the contrary,
competent counsel would have explained that Snack Factory had no
business reason to license its valuable intellectual property to
Pepperidge on such terms,” they allege.

“Snack Factory took the position that the agreement allowed
Pepperidge Farms to make its pretzel crackers only in original and
white cheddar flavors and in six-ounce packages. But after
executing the agreement, Pepperidge Farms filed several patent
applications for pretzel crackers that were slight variations on
the ones patented by Snack Factory.”

Save this to show the next person who thinks Free/Open
Source is weird and scary– the FOSS world is a haven of sanity and
reason compared to the “normal” business world– ed.

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