HOUSTON – AZA’s appellate team reversed an $18.3 million judgment in a California case over trade secrets in a cosmetic penile implant case. 

“There were no secrets here to be kept. Multiple patents had already put all the ideas claimed as “secret” in the public domain so the jury finding was properly overturned,” said AZA partner Kelsi Stayart White, who represented all but one defendant in the case with AZA with partners Jason McManis and Weining Bai. Russell Post at Beck Redden represented one other defendant.  

Ms. White notes that these arguments were developed by the AZA trial team but to no avail until the appellate court reviewed it. 

In 2020, Dr. James Elist, creator of the Penuma penile implant, filed a lawsuit claiming Dr. Robert Cornell and others misappropriated trade secrets and breached a contract by starting a competing implant company called Augmenta. Dr. Elist had previously demonstrated his implant for Dr. Cornell, who signed a non-disclosure agreement at the time. 

In 2023 a Los Angeles jury found against Dr. Cornell and others, but the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit reversed the jury finding. The appellate court noted that four alleged trade secrets were not secrets and therefore nothing was misappropriated, and no non-disclosure contract was breached. 

“We hold that there was no legally sufficient evidentiary basis to support the jury’s finding that plaintiffs had met their burden to show that each of the asserted trade secrets was a protectable trade secret under California law,” U.S. Circuit Judge Timothy B. Dyk wrote in the opinion. 

The opinion also reversed the invalidation of two of AZA’s client’s patents. And the opinion reversed all but $1 million of the lower court’s award noting that a Penuma trademark was used without permission. 

The appellate win was covered by Law360 in “Fed. Circ. Reverses $18M Penile Implant Trade Secrets Win” (subscription required), in Texas Lawbook  “Litigation Roundup: Texas Firms Win Appeal in Penile Implant Trade Secrets Case”, in Texas Lawyer “Federal Circuit Tosses $17.3M Verdict in Penile Implant Trade Secret Case” (subscription required), and in Bloomberg news “Penile Implant Trade Secrets Verdict Ditched on Appeal” (subscription required),

The case is International Medical Devices, Inc. et al. v. Robert Cornell et al. Case numbers 2025-1580, 2025-1605, sent to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit from the United States District Court for the Central District of California. 

Houston trial boutique Ahmad Zavitsanos & Mensing, or AZA, has earned repeated recognition from Chambers USA among the best in Texas in commercial law and intellectual property; the firm has been listed by Best Lawyers’ Best Law Firms as one of the country’s best commercial litigation firms for 13 years; has been named Litigation Department of the Year by Texas Lawyer three times; and was dubbed a Texas Powerhouse law firm by Law360.