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Tag: Juul

  • Juul Cleared in Patent Dispute with Altria

    Juul Cleared in Patent Dispute with Altria

    The U.S. International Trade Commission affirmed a judge’s decision exculpating Juul in an infringement case brought by Altria-owned NJOY over several vaping patents. In January, Administrative Law Judge Doris Johnson Hines found that Juul did not violate Section 337 of the Tariff Act by importing vaping products, which Altria claimed was an infringement on two patents covering vaping technologies.

    In a three-page decision, the ITC reviewed the noninfringement finding to revise a citation in the judge’s initial determination that concluded NJOY “did not satisfy the economic prong of the domestic industry requirement, which requires the complainant to show that it has made significant investment in products protected by the patent,” Theresa Schliep wrote for Law 360.

    Concerning the economic prong, the ITC took “no position on these findings,” the decision said, and the ITC declined to review the remainder of the decision, including the judge’s conclusion that Juul did not violate Section 337.

    The Juul products the ITC investigated were “electronic nicotine delivery systems” and the cartridges or pods that go with them, as well as the pieces that make up the pods, such as “atomizers, subassemblies, devices subassemblies, [and] chargers,” according to court filings.

  • Judge Seals Docs in Juul Case

    Judge Seals Docs in Juul Case

    On Tuesday (Feb. 25), a federal judge in North Carolina granted requests by R.J. Reynolds Vapor Co. and Philip Morris’ parent company, Altria, to seal documents in their ongoing royalty dispute, keeping details of their licensing agreements with the vape brand JUUL confidential.

    “The court ruled that the agreements contained sensitive business information — including financial terms, licensing strategies and negotiation details — that could harm competitive standing, and all six motions to seal were granted,” Andrea Keckley wrote for Law360.

    The court found that an amendment to a licensing agreement between Altria and JUUL and a copy of a licensing agreement between the two were confidential and that disclosing them would “harm the party’s competitive standing or otherwise harm its business interests.” The filings stem RJR’s bid for relief against a $95 million judgement after a jury sided with Altria in a 2022 patent infringement case. The defense has argued that it should receive relief because a deal with Juul sublicensed the asserted patents.

    “Ultimately, however, this court need not decide whether the documents or hearing are protected by the First Amendment’s right of access, because even assuming the First Amendment standard applies, movants have put forth compelling interests in sealing the order and the proposed sealing is narrowly tailored such that the First Amendment right of access has been overcome,” U.S. District Judge William Lindsay Osteen Jr wrote. “Although this court has considered less drastic alternatives to sealing, the parties have already redacted their filings so as to allow public access to as much information as possible without compromising sensitive business information,” he wrote. “It is this court’s view that the parties’ proposed redactions reflect the least drastic alternative at this time.”

  • Altria Loses Juul Appeal in British Columbia

    Altria Loses Juul Appeal in British Columbia

    Image: StandbildCA

    Altria Group has lost an appeal to challenge the territorial jurisdiction of the British Columbia courts in a Juul class action lawsuit, reports Victoria Now.

    “The plaintiffs allege the e-cigarette devices are hazardous products but were falsely marketed as a desirable, safe and healthier alternative to smoking,” the civil claim states. “The plaintiffs additionally allege that the defendants conspired together to addict a new generation to nicotine or, alternatively, conspired to maintain and expand the market for Juul products using unlawful means knowing that addiction and other injuries were likely to result.”

    Altria was brought into the litigation with Juul Labs Canada and Juul Labs USA in September 2020, a year after the original civil claim was filed, following Altria acquiring a 35 percent stake in Juul in 2018 for $12.8 billion.

    According to the litigation, Juul and Altria allegedly “conspired” to “employ strategies perfected in the cigarette industry” to advertise and market Juul products to youth.

    “It is alleged that the defendants exploited regulatory loopholes and relied on social media and other viral advertising methods to hook young people on Juul, despite the defendants’ knowledge of the dangers associated with vaping. Altria is alleged to have provided strategies, analyses and services to the defendants in furtherance of the conspiracy,” a judgment reads.

    Altria’s claim that the British Columbia courts did not have jurisdiction over the action was dismissed in 2022. Altria then appealed the decision, claiming the judge “failed to address evidence that was materially relevant.”

    Altria argued that the judge ignored or misconceived evidence that Altria did not ship Juul products to Canada or send Juul marketing materials to Canadian addresses, among other things.

    The appeal decision found that there is not a real and substantial connection because class members may have “hopped the border and been influenced by Altria’s activities in the United States.”

    “Rather,” the appeal decision reads, “the judge found that the respondents established a good arguable case that Altria was a party to a conspiracy to advertise and market Juul e-cigarettes to young people in a manner that was misleading about the health risks, including the risk of addiction.”

  • Federal Judge OKs Altria, Juul Class Action

    Federal Judge OKs Altria, Juul Class Action

    Image: H_Ko

    A federal judge approved the final part of a class action settlement with the e-cigarette company Juul Labs and its parent company Altria, bringing the settlement total to just over $300 million.

    In 2018, the plaintiffs charged Juul Labs with misleading the public about the addictiveness of Juul and the risk of the e-cigarettes and its nicotine cartridges.

    The plaintiffs also said Juul had targeted teenagers with candy-flavored Juul pods and “multimillion-dollar ad campaigns and social media blitzes using alluring imagery.”

    The case survived a number of hurdles: The judge denied multiple motions to dismiss the suit and agreed to certify four different classes of plaintiffs (a nationwide class, a nationwide youth class, a California class and a California youth class).

    In January, the judge gave preliminary approval to a $255 million settlement between Juul Labs and the plaintiffs, according to Courthouse news. Friday’s ruling grants approval to Altria’s payment of $45,531,250. The sides have yet to reach an agreement on attorneys fees.

    “Court finds that this monetary recovery is fair, reasonable, and adequate given the risks of proceeding to trial and the maximum recovery potentially available to Settlement Class Members if the Class Representatives had prevailed at trial,” wrote U.S. District Judge William Orrick in his order.

    Last year, Juul agreed to pay six states $462 million to settle claims that it had marketed its vaping products to teenagers. The year before that, it agreed to pay $438.5 million to 33 different states and Puerto Rico.

    Altria Group exchanged its entire investment in Juul Labs in 2023 for a non-exclusive, irrevocable global license to certain of Juul’s heated tobacco intellectual property.

  • Juul Supports Tighter Youth Access Rules

    Juul Supports Tighter Youth Access Rules

    Credit: Piter2121

    Juul Labs wants tighter e-cigarette regulations to help stave off youth demand while also making the industry safer overall.

    In a recent open letter addressed to the Florida House of Representatives and Senate, the company urged lawmakers to endorse legislative proposals to regulate the marketplace for legal nicotine vaping products in Florida.

    The pending proposals require state regulators to develop a directory listing of certified nicotine product manufacturers and certified nicotine products. They also subject retail and wholesale nicotine product dealers to inspections or audits; prohibit sale, shipment or distribution of certain nicotine products into this state; provide criminal penalties; require entities that seek to sell nicotine products or dispensing devices to obtain a wholesale nicotine products dealer permit; provide that permit holders must consent to inspections and searches without warrant; and provide for seizure and destruction of unlawful nicotine products, according to Florida’s Senate.

    In the letter, Juul Labs said it “is on a mission to transition the world’s billion adult smokers away from combustible cigarettes, eliminate their use and combat underage usage of our products,” according to media reports.

    The letter highlighted what the company described as extensive efforts to ensure product quality and compliance with regulatory standards. The letter also emphasized significant investments in product development, regulatory science and manufacturing quality controls.

    Penned by Juul Labs’ regional director for state government affairs, Jennifer Cunningham, the letter states that the company wants a better-regulated market. Cunningham cited measures implemented by Juul Labs, including supporting “Tobacco 21” laws to raise the legal age for tobacco product sales to 21, restricting vaping flavors to tobacco and menthol, limiting product purchases per transaction and promoting retail partner compliance through ID checking and technology advancements.

    However, despite these efforts, the letter points out the challenges posed by a burgeoning illegal vape market in Florida, with the state being the primary destination for sales of illicit vapor products in the U.S. The vape maker also expressed readiness to assist Florida legislators in formulating policies that foster a well-regulated market for legal vapor products.

  • Florida Sues Juul

    Florida Sues Juul

    Image: Ulf

    Florida’s attorney general, Ashley Moody, has filed a lawsuit against Juul Labs, alleging that the company improperly marketed its products to children and offered misleading information about its products’ nicotine content, reports WUSF.

    The suit was filed in Hillsborough County Circuit Court. It seeks civil penalties and an injunction to prevent Juul “targeting children through their marketing and product design and from deceiving consumers with respect to the nicotine concentration.”

    “Juul relentlessly marketed to underage users with launch parties, advertisements using trendy-looking and young models, social media posts and free samples,” the lawsuit states. “It created a technology-focused, sleek design that could be easily concealed and sold its product in flavors known to be attractive to underage users. Juul also manipulated the chemical composition of its product to make the vapor less harsh on the throats of the young and inexperienced consumers it courted. To preserve its young customer base, Juul relied on age verification techniques that it knew were ineffective.”

    Juul responded to the lawsuit, stating that “it is disappointing to see the Florida attorney general direct her state’s resources to suing Juul Labs.”

    Juul’s response sets out “a few facts that should be understood,” including that “Florida’s attorney general initially led the negotiations between the state attorneys general and Juul Labs. For reasons that have not been explained to the public, she ultimately decided not to participate in a settlement to which 48 states and territories are now party to. Had she done so, like all those other jurisdictions, Florida would have its share of millions of dollars to help combat underage use and develop cessation programs. Instead, the Florida attorney general has now embarked on a drawn-out, expensive and uncertain legal process.”

    “Second,” the response continued, “Florida today suffers from the highest sales in the nation of illicit and potentially harmful disposable products emanating from China. These products are not in compliance with the [U.S. Food and Drug Administration’s] regulatory regime and, in many cases, are flagrantly targeting the state’s children. By contrast, over the past four years, Juul Labs has taken meaningful steps, including ceasing distribution of nontobacco, nonmenthol products in advance of FDA guidance on flavors, halting mass market product advertising, and restructuring our entire company with an emphasis on combating underage use. In part, due to these efforts, we have seen underage use of Juul products cut by 95 percent.”

    The response went on to allege that “Florida has the highest sales of these mostly foreign-made products in the United States, with over 60 percent of vapor sales dominated by disposables whose companies often disregard responsible practices with inappropriate flavor names and questionable marketing. Over the past months, we have been engaged with the attorney general’s office to help create a best-in-class program to combat illicit products. Even though Juul Labs plans to fight this case vigorously, the company remains ready to help Florida stem the tide of the proliferation of Chinese-made disposable products that have found what amounts to be a safe haven for foreign-made illegal vapor products.”

  • U.K. Government Draws Fire for Support of Juul

    U.K. Government Draws Fire for Support of Juul

    Image: Tobacco Reporter archive

    The government in the United Kingdom has been criticized for its “completely inappropriate” endorsement of Juul vaping products, according to The Guardian. Many organizations blame the manufacturer for fueling an “epidemic” of underage vaping in the U.S.

    Juul Labs was lauded for its underage vaping prevention efforts in an official briefing circulated by the Department of Health and Social Care about the prime minister’s plan to close a loophole allowing free samples to be given to children, according to media reports.

    The press release—which included quotes from Prime Minister Rishi Sunak, England’s chief medical officer, Chris Whitty, and Health Minister Neil O’Brien—portrayed the company as a leader in combating youth vaping, saying it “takes steps to ensure its products do not appeal to and are not used by anyone who is underage and encourages others in the sector to do the same.”

    It also included a quote from Joe Murillo, a former tobacco executive and chief regulatory officer at Juul Labs, who praised the U.K. government’s policy and called for more to be done “to combat underage use of these products.”

    The briefing—which was sent to journalists before the policy was announced publicly—appears to have directly resulted in positive media coverage for Juul, with Murillo’s quote republished by four national newspapers.

  • Juul Labs to Pay $462 Million to Six US States

    Juul Labs to Pay $462 Million to Six US States

    Image: lyudmilka_n | Adobe Stock

    Juul Labs has agreed to pay $462 million to settle claims by six U.S. states, including New York and California, that it unlawfully marketed its products to minors.

    With the deal, Juul has now settled with 45 states for more than $1 billion. The company did not admit wrongdoing in the settlement, which also included Colorado, Illinois, Massachusetts and New Mexico as well as the District of Columbia.

    Juul announced on Dec. 6 it has secured an investment to cover the cost of the settlement. The company has been in talks with two early investors to fund a bailout that would cover legal liabilities.

    The states had accused Juul of falsely marketing its e-cigarettes as less addictive than cigarettes and targeted minors with glamorous advertising campaigns, according to Reuters.

    “Juul’s lies led to a nationwide public health crisis and put addictive products in the hands of minors who thought they were doing something harmless,” New York Attorney General Letitia James said at a news conference.

    The company said that use of its products by people under age 18 had fallen by 95 percent since the fall of 2019, when it changed its marketing practices as part of a “company-wide reset.”

    In September, Juul Labs agreed to pay nearly $440 million to settle a two-year investigation by 33 U.S. states into the marketing of its vaping products.

    Juul’s e-cigarettes were briefly banned in the U.S. in late June after the Food and Drug Administration concluded that the company had failed to show that the sale of its products would be appropriate for public health. But following an appeal, the health regulator put the ban on hold and agreed to an additional review of Juul’s marketing application.

    In October, Juul published the details of its MDO appeal. In late September, Juul shareholder Altria Group exercised the option to be released from its noncompete deal with the e-cigarette maker.

    Last month, Altria Group exchanged its entire investment in Juul Labs for a nonexclusive, irrevocable global license to certain of Juul’s heated-tobacco intellectual property.

  • Vuse Market Share Grows While Juul Drops

    Vuse Market Share Grows While Juul Drops

    Image: Tobacco Reporter archive

    R.J. Reynolds Vapor Co. has continued to expand Vuse’s market share gap with Juul, according to the latest Nielsen convenience store report.

    Vuse’s market share rose from 41.5 percent in the previous report to 42.2 percent compared with Juul declining to 26.1 percent.

    The latest Nielsen analysis covers the four-week period ending March 25, according to media reports.

    According to Barclays, Nielsen largely covers the big chains. For the smaller chains, the group extrapolates trends, which is why trend changes don’t appear immediately in Nielsen.

    Consumer demand for tobacco products has ebbed and flowed over the past 12 months, mostly from the impact of inflation and recent upticks in traditional cigarette prices.

    No. 3 Njoy was unchanged at 2.7 percent while Fontem Ventures’ blu eCigs were unchanged at 1.4 percent.

    On March 6, Altria Group Inc. delivered another shake-up to the tobacco industry by confirming it would pay $2.75 billion in cash to take full ownership of Njoy.

    Altria cleared the way for the Njoy purchase by exiting its minority stake in No. 2 e-cigarette company Juul while acquiring global licensing rights.

    Juul’s four-week dollar sales in the latest report have dropped from a 50.2 percent increase in the Aug. 10, 2019, report to a 23.9 percent decline in the latest report.

    By comparison, Reynolds’ Vuse was up 31.1 percent in the latest report while Njoy was down 10.9 percent, blu eCigs were down 37.4 percent and Japan Tobacco’s Logic was up 5.2 percent.

    As recently as May 2019, Juul held a 74.6 percent U.S. e-cigarette market share.

  • First Trial for Juul Youth Marketing Claims

    First Trial for Juul Youth Marketing Claims

    Credit: Mehaniq41

    A trial against Juul Labs and Altria for youth marketing begins today in Minnesota, USA. It is the first state to go to trial against the e-cigarette manufacturer and tobacco company.

    Jury selection in the trial comes more than three years after Minnesota Attorney General Keith Ellison first filed a lawsuit against Juul Labs, reports CARE11.

    “We will prove how Juul and Altria deceived and hooked a generation of Minnesota youth on their products, causing both great harm to the public and great expense to the state to remediate that harm,” said Ellison in a press release.

    Minnesota is the first case to go to trial against Juul since more than a dozen states sued the company beginning in 2019.

    “It’s a pretty significant case,” said David Schultz, a law professor at the University of Minnesota. “The case comes down to two or three basic issues. First, it’s about the claim that Juul marketed to minors. Second, it did nothing in terms of trying to prevent minors from accessing their product. And third, it was about the fact that they did not make appropriate disclosures regarding the health and safety risks surrounding the use of vaping and some of these smokeless tobaccos.”

    The state believes Juul Labs, enabled by Altria, “engaged in consumer fraud, negligence and created a public nuisance.”

    Altria Group exchanged its entire investment in Juul Labs for a nonexclusive, irrevocable global license to certain of Juul’s heated-tobacco intellectual property in early March.

    This isn’t new territory for the state. Minnesota was the first state in the country to successfully sue the tobacco industry and win in the 1990s.

    Earlier this year, a U.S. district judge handed Juul Labs preliminary court approval of a $255 million settlement resolving claims by consumers that it deceptively marketed e-cigarettes, as the company seeks to resolve thousands of lawsuits.

    The company reached a nearly $24 million settlement with the city of Chicago in mid-March.

    Juul and Altria have denied the allegations.

    In court documents from November 2022, the defendants stated, “Minnesota has reaped billions of dollars from tobacco settlements and taxes over the last decade for the purpose of preventing tobacco use and remedying its harms. Yet even after determining that there was an alleged youth vaping problem among Minnesota youth, time and again the state chose to ignore recommended tobacco prevention funding guidelines and instead used these funds to bankroll unrelated projects—like the Minnesota Vikings football stadium.”