Karl Storz Endoscopy-America, Inc. v. Surgical Technologies, Inc.

Appellant Karl Storz Endoscopy-America, Inc. (“Storz”) appeals the district court’s grant of summary judgment to ap-pellees Surgical Technologies, Inc. (“Sur-gi-Tech”) and Pacific Medical Repair (“Pacific”) on Storz’s trademark infringement claims. 1 Storz contends that the district court erred in determining that Surgi-Tech’s repair and refurbishment of Storz’s rigid endoscopes, and Pacific’s solicitation of those repairs, do not constitute Lanham Act violations.

I. BACKGROUND

A. Factual Background

Karl Storz GmbH & Co. (“KST”) has manufactured and sold Karl Storz rigid endoscopes for many years. Appellant Storz, a wholly-owned subsidiary of KST, is the exclusive United States distributor of Karl Storz rigid endoscopes. Endoscopes are precision surgical instruments used in many types of minimally-invasive surgical and diagnostic procedures, such as arthroscopy, urology and gynecology, to *852 obtain a focused and properly illuminated view of internal body areas under examination. An endoscope consists of an elongated tube, or shaft, containing fiber optics and lenses which illuminate and transmit a view of the internal body area to the end of the shaft where it can be…