## Facts

- Dr. Sheila Lyons, an equine veterinarian, worked with other veterinarians from 1999–2004 to create a veterinary specialty organization to seek American Veterinary Medical Association (AVMA) recognition.
- The organizing committee, chaired by Dr. Robert Gillette, used “American College of Veterinary Sports Medicine and Rehabilitation” as the proposed organization’s name by at least 2002.
- Lyons helped draft the AVMA letter of intent, worked on the accreditation petition, and drafted proposed bylaws and articles of incorporation for the anticipated organization.
- Lyons was dismissed from the organizing committee in July 2004.
- In 2005 Lyons applied to register THE AMERICAN COLLEGE OF VETERINARY SPORTS MEDICINE AND REHABILITATION for veterinary education services, initially on an intent-to-use basis.
- After refusal on the Principal Register, the PTO registered the mark on the Supplemental Register in 2006.
- The organizing group continued and obtained AVMA provisional recognition in 2010 under the name “American College of Veterinary Sports Medicine and Rehabilitation.”
- The organization petitioned the TTAB to cancel Lyons’s registration; the TTAB canceled it on the ground Lyons was not the owner when she filed, rendering the application void ab initio.

## Issues

1. Whether Lyons owned the service mark at the time she filed the trademark application, such that the Supplemental Register registration was valid.
2. What standard governs service-mark ownership disputes between a departing member and the continuing group that developed and used the mark.

## Decision

- The Federal Circuit affirmed the TTAB’s cancellation of the Supplemental Register registration.
- The court held substantial evidence supported that the mark was intended to identify the collective organization, not Lyons individually.
- The court agreed that the relevant public associated the mark with the organization pursuing AVMA recognition, and looked to that entity to stand behind service quality.
- Because only the owner may apply to register a mark, Lyons’s application was void at filing, making cancellation proper.

## Legal Principles

- A trademark application filed by a non-owner is void ab initio, and any resulting registration is subject to cancellation.
- In ownership disputes over service marks between a departing member and a remnant group, relevant considerations include:
  - the parties’ objective intentions or expectations regarding the mark;
  - who the public associates with the mark; and
  - to whom the public looks to stand behind the quality of the services offered under the mark.
- In collaborative efforts to form an organization, individual participation and claimed priority do not establish personal ownership when the mark functioned to identify the collective enterprise.

## Conclusion

The court upheld cancellation of Lyons’s registration because the record showed the mark identified the organizing group’s emerging specialty college, and Lyons’s later unilateral application did not reflect ownership at the time of filing.


Lyons v. Am. Coll. of Vet. Sports Med. & Rehab., 859 F.3d 1023 (Fed. Cir. 2017)