He learned he could not hide a poor business model by suing virtually all his trademarking competitors – trademark services and trademark attorneys alike, just because his market share dropped from being one of the top USA filers of trademarks. Victims of Raj’s overly litigious rage included LegalZoom, Trademark Engine, The Trademark Company, LegalSherpa, Trademarks411, Trademark Plus and not to be left out - even the UPSTO itself.
On August 29th, one of those competitors, TradeMark Express bit back by filing a $1,666,666 counter lawsuit against Trademarkia, LegalForce Worldwide and Raj Abhyanker personally for predatory pricing negligence, ethical violations and fraud.
Chris DeMassa, owner of TradeMark Express claims, “It’s one thing to compete fairly in the market place as a low cost non-legal trademarking company specializing in comprehensive legal research to help clients avoid likelihood of confusion refusals from the USPTO or a State, as well as future cease and desist lawsuits from those with prior rights under Common Law, (those company’s without trademarks, but have first use rights nevertheless.). But, it is another to compete with an attorney with superior standing because first they are an attorney, because people universally trust attorneys. So, when that same attorney ethically betrays that trust to file 100’s of thousands of trademarks blindly with no prior research whatsoever so that his fee can be 1/3 our already low fee and also 90% less than competing trademark attorney fees. When it takes us 8 to 10 hours to process one trademark, including our network of independent trademark attorneys for final analysis of research and we have to charge $600 for our Premium Package, how can Trademarkia do the same work, as attorneys, for just $199? The answer is they don’t. They just file everyone blindly, and badly. Then if there is a USPTO refusal or cease and desist order, they charge lots more fees to argue marks that should have never been filed in the first place. How does $600 compete with $199? How do you compete against that for a day, let alone 10 years?! How damaging is that to business owners who invest an average of $30,000 into their new business, just to find out a year later the business name they chose belongs to another company and they have to change it because they are infringing and cannot get a trademark. What is even worse, the selfish habits of Trademarkia have denigrated the marketplace into not trusting needed trademarking services and competent trademark attorneys alike, who base the trademark filing upon true comprehensive research. It hurts employees of those businesses who cannot afford to rebrand, all their suppliers the marketing chains who accepted them. Small business start-ups and new product development is the engine of our economy. Preventable business failures hurt everyone.”
DeMassa continued to say, “One of our countersuit’s 68 exhibits demonstrate the perversity of the corrupt nature of Trademarkia’s practice. As public record at the USPTO we easily surveyed attorney Raj Abhyanker’s own DEAD trademarks to see how many it took to get to 100. We always knew this was a problem because of caller complaints, but we were floored by the frequency. It only took a couple days to compile 100 marks that should never had been filed. The surprising thing was that it took a survey of only 155 consecutive filings to reach 100. We did not want to accused of cherry picking trademark filings. Stunningly, 62 were likelihood of confusion refusals – the worst kind – that could have easily found if a comprehensive legal search had been done. The same research the USPTO tells people to do before filing any trademark. The other 38 DEAD marks were judgement mistakes an experienced firm would normally help a client avoid, like merely descriptive refusals or simple specimen errors the client refused to spend more $ to easily fix. So, Trademarkia’s poor record is even worse, because simple mistakes could have been avoided. The expected ethics of the legal profession is for attorneys to provide honest, accurate, good legal advice. Not with Trademarkia. For over 10 years they have received the same type of USPTO refusals, over and over again, yet they have not changed their practices. It has been apparent to us the answer is an ever changing quest for market share – at the expense of everyone else”, said DeMassa.
Proposed Class Action Lawsuit
TradeMark Express is seeking ex-clients of Trademarkia who have had their trademark applications refused or cease and desisted against. We want to hear from businesses damaged by Trademarkia’s unethical practice so we can put together a class action law suit to help recoup any monetary losses.
We think there are between 30,000 to 50,000 businesses that have been damaged when their new trademarks were refused or later over the years opposed because of Trademarkia’s predatory pricing practices. If your company may have been injured, please contact TradeMark Express @ 650-948-0530.

LINKS:
TradeMark Express – http://www.tmexpress.com/index.php
comprehensive legal research – https://www.tmexpress.com/choose-trademark-express/#cs
Common Law - https://www.tmexpress.com/trademark-express-services/#us
Premium Package - https://www.tmexpress.com/order-my-trademark/
USPTO – https://www.uspto.gov/trademarks-getting-started/why-hire-private-trademark-attorney.
merely descriptive refusals - https://www.uspto.gov/trademark/additional-guidance-and-resources/possible-grounds-refusal-mark
Raj Abhyanker’s own DEAD trademarks – See Attached.
contact TradeMark Express - https://www.tmexpress.com/contact-us/