A U.S. federal judge has overturned a jury verdict that found Lululemon infringed a Nike sneaker patent, wiping out a $355,450 damages award and ruling that the asserted patent claims are invalid as obvious. The decision is a major legal win for Lululemon in an ongoing feud over knit footwear technology used in its Blissfeel, Chargefeel and Strongfeel women’s running shoes.
What The Judge Actually Decided
In a March 31, 2026 opinion, U.S. District Judge Arun Subramanian in Manhattan granted Lululemon’s motion for judgment as a matter of law, holding that the claims of Nike’s U.S. Patent No. 8,266,749, covering methods of manufacturing knit sneaker uppers, are invalid for obviousness under U.S. patent law. That ruling overturns a March 2025 jury verdict that had found Lululemon infringed the ’749 patent and awarded Nike $355,450 in damages, far below the roughly $2.8 million (about 5% of shoe revenues) Nike originally sought.
Judge Subramanian concluded that, in light of prior art, the patented manufacturing method would have been obvious to a skilled technician, meaning Nike cannot enforce those claims against Lululemon and is not entitled to any damages. The court also rejected Nike’s bid to increase the now erased award, closing the door, for now, on monetary relief in this case.
How We Got Here: Nike v. Lululemon Over Flyknit Inspired Tech
The dispute dates back to January 2023, when Nike sued Lululemon, alleging that its Blissfeel, Chargefeel and Strongfeel sneakers unlawfully used knit upper technology covered by several Flyknit related patents. A New York jury later found that Lululemon infringed the ’749 patent but did not infringe a second asserted patent (U.S. Patent No. 9,375,046), already narrowing Nike’s claims.
Even at that stage, damages were modest: the jury’s $355,450 award fell well short of Nike’s requested royalty on Lululemon’s shoe revenues. Behind the scenes, Lululemon had also challenged the same patent at the Patent Trial and Appeal Board (PTAB); the district court previously refused to pause the case pending PTAB review, but acknowledged that a finding of invalidity would effectively wipe out the dispute. Judge Subramanian’s ruling now achieves that outcome at the trial court level.
What This Means For Nike, Lululemon And Footwear IP
For Lululemon, the ruling removes an immediate financial and legal overhang around its women’s running shoes and is being hailed as a validation that its footwear technology clears the bar of patent law, at least as to this Nike patent. And for Nike, the decision is a setback in its broader strategy to aggressively enforce its knit footwear IP portfolio against competitors and may prompt appeals or a recalibration of how it asserts certain patents going forward.
The case highlights the limits of using broad method patents to fence off design and manufacturing approaches once similar techniques become common across the industry.
Nike still holds a deep bench of patents around Flyknit and other footwear technologies, this loss shows that courts will closely scrutinize their novelty and non obviousness, especially when rivals can point to dense prior art in knitting, textiles and shoe construction.
Takeaways For Brands Playing In Performance Footwear
Claim scope matters. Overly broad interpretations of manufacturing patents can backfire if courts conclude that what’s claimed is simply an obvious combination of existing techniques. Litigation isn’t always a clear win. Even with an initial jury verdict, plaintiffs can see damages erased at the post trial stage, underscoring the importance of parallel strategies like PTAB challenges and settlement options.
Design and tech differentiation still count. For brands expanding from apparel into footwear (like Lululemon), this case is a reminder to invest in genuine technical and design innovation, but also to be prepared to defend it in an IP landscape dominated by incumbents like Nike. As of now, Lululemon emerges with a clean slate on this particular knit footwear claim, while Nike faces fresh questions about how far its Flyknit patent fortress can stretch in an increasingly crowded field of performance sneaker innovation.
