Elon Musk’s X Corp Sues Startup Over Attempt to Cancel Twitter Trademarks

Elon Musk’s X Corp has filed a lawsuit against a startup, Operation Bluebird, after the company attempted to cancel X’s Twitter trademarks to launch a rival platform under the Twitter name. The complaint was lodged in Delaware federal court on Tuesday.

X argued that its Twitter brand remains “alive and well” and is not available for use, claiming that Bluebird’s efforts to “steal” the name constitute trademark infringement. The lawsuit emphasizes that millions of users still access the platform via twitter.com, businesses and individuals continue to refer to it as Twitter, and X actively maintains and enforces its Twitter trademarks.

Operation Bluebird, based in Virginia, petitioned the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office on December 2 to cancel X’s federal Twitter trademarks, asserting that the brand had been abandoned following X’s rebranding of the platform in 2023. Bluebird intends to use the marks for a rival service called “twitter.new” and has separately applied to register its own Twitter trademark. The petition was submitted by Stephen Coates, a former Twitter trademark lawyer and current general counsel for Bluebird.

X’s lawsuit notes that a rebranding does not constitute abandonment of trademark rights and warns that Bluebird’s platform could create consumer confusion. The company is seeking an unspecified sum in damages while reinforcing that Twitter remains one of the world’s most recognized brands under X Corp ownership.

This legal battle underscores ongoing disputes over brand identity and intellectual property in the social media space following Musk’s $44 billion acquisition of Twitter in 2022 and its subsequent transformation into X.