Oct 22 (Reuters) - A federal appeals court on Tuesday

sided with an Arizona personal injury law firm sued by rival

Lerner & Rowe, which had claimed trademark infringement

involving the purchase of Google ads.

The 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals upheld a lower court's

ruling that granted a bid by the Arizona firm, the Accident Law

Group, for summary judgment in the trademark infringement

lawsuit brought by Lerner & Rowe over ALG's ads that appeared on

Lerner & Rowe's Google search results. Lerner & Rowe had accused

ALG of attaching ads for its firm to search terms or "keywords"

associated with Lerner & Rowe and siphoning off potential

clients.

The appeals court said that despite Lerner & Rowe's "strong"

trademark and its expenditure of more than $100 million on

marketing in Arizona, data from Google and ALG showed that only

a tiny fraction of people who called ALG about potential legal

representation mentioned Lerner & Rowe and therefore may have

been confused.

ALG, also known as Brown, Engstrand & Shely, has purchased

Google Ad keywords on Lerner & Rowe's Google search results

since the firm's founding in 2015, according to the opinion.

Lerner & Rowe, which has offices all over Arizona and in

several other states around the country, sued ALG in Arizona

federal court in 2021, alleging federal and state trademark

infringement and unjust enrichment.

In 2023, U.S. District Judge David Campbell granted ALG's

bid for summary judgment, in part relying on data from ALG's

intake department, which said it received a little more than 200

phone calls from people who specifically mentioned "Lerner &

Rowe." In contrast, ALG's ads appeared on "Lerner & Rowe"

searches more than 109,000 times between 2017 and 2021, Campbell

said.

The appeals court on Tuesday said that the district court was

correct to conclude that the case was "one of the rare trademark

infringement cases susceptible to summary judgment.

Maria Speth of Jaburg Wilk, one of the attorneys defending

ALG, said in a statement that the appellate court "correctly

vindicated Accident Law Group's right to engage in key word

advertising."

Attorneys for Lerner & Rowe did not immediately respond to

requests for comment.

U.S. Circuit Judge Roopali Desai concurred with the appeals

court's unanimous decision but wrote a separate opinion urging

the full 9th Circuit to consider whether bidding and purchasing

on ad keywords constitute "use in commerce" under federal law, a

necessary element to prove trademark confusion.