The moniker for Perplexity AI Inc.’s anticipated browser hangs in the balance at an all-day hearing set for Wednesday, when the $14 billion company will fight to keep calling its product “Comet.”
The AI startup will face off with software company Comet ML Inc., which alleges trademark infringement and seeks to temporarily block Perplexity’s use of “Comet.” The parties have a full day to present evidence, witnesses including one of Perplexity’s co-founders, and technology demonstrations to sway Judge Yvonne Gonzalez Rogers in Oakland.
Rogers said at an earlier hearing she needed to understand how the browser compares to Comet ML’s platform for developing and managing AI models to determine possible market overlap and the likelihood of consumer confusion.
Perplexity argues the companies’ customers are significantly different because Comet ML offers a boutique product while its browser will target all internet users. Its Comet browser is currently in beta form, and its counsel said in May it could fully launch after the end of June.
The case is a “shakeout of what’s the likelihood of confusion if something involves AI,” said Troutman Pepper Locke LLP partner Michael Hobbs Jr.
The lawsuit in the US District Court for the Northern District of California joins a handful of recent trademark lawsuits targeting AI companies. Perplexity faces another over the “perplexity” mark, while OpenAI Inc. was temporarily blocked from using “io” for a new hardward startup after “IYO,” a wearable AI-device maker, accused it of infringement. OpenAI faces yet another dispute over an “Open AI” trademark (with a space).
Comet ML’s chances may have been better five years ago when AI wasn’t so pervasive and any AI business could arguably share a market, Hobbs said. But emerging industries are sometimes painted with a broad brush, and the outcome depends on how quickly the court grasps the alleged technical distinctions between browsers and development platforms.
Mayer Brown partner Richard Assmus said Perplexity’s arguments about product differences are convincing, but “it’s not a slam dunk either way.” Another factor—the defendant’s intent—may favor Comet ML because Perplexity admitted to knowing about Comet’s trademark before deploying the same name.
“The risk is never zero” with an arbitrary mark like “Comet,” Assmus said. Maybe Perplexity thinks “they have so much funding” that they’ll reach an agreement or “use part of their last big funding round to buy out the rights.”
Counsel for the parties didn’t respond to requests for comment.
Deep-Pocketed Targets
The impact the “io” order may have on Rogers is difficult to anticipate, said Syracuse University law professor Shubha Ghosh, because trademark cases are fact-intensive and judges aren’t beholden to their colleagues’ opinions. But “my instinct is it doesn’t help,” he said.
Well-funded AI companies like Perplexity make “juicy targets,” Assmus said. “If I were the plaintiff Comet, I’d be thinking like, ‘How much can we get out of this?’”
Perplexity’s valuation soared to $14 billion in May, just three years after its founding by alumni of OpenAI Inc. and Meta Platforms Inc. The startup’s AI tool summarizes search results, lists citations, and refines user queries. Now, Perplexity’s eyes are on developing an AI-powered web browser to compete with Google Chrome.
A week after Meta bought a stake in competitor Scale AI for $14.3 billion, Bloomberg News reported Friday that Apple is considering a deal with Perplexity.
Startups are also “more risk-loving than your typical trademark owner who really wants to avoid controversy,” Assmus said, so Perplexity may be in love with the “Comet” name and moving forward knowing of the conflict.
On June 5, days after a hearing on the motion for a temporary restraining order, the company petitioned the US Patent and Trademark Office to invalidate a Comet ML patent covering a system for AI model training. Perplexity on June 17 also initiated a PTO proceeding to cancel Comet ML’s registration of another mark, “COMET.ML.”
Comet ML acknowledged those efforts in a June 20 motion, calling them part of Perplexity’s “campaign of collateral retaliatory attacks” to deter the lawsuit.
Hobbs said he’s seen similar escalation tactics in other trademark cases. “Any combination of carrots and sticks are very much on the table when you’re trying to get a case like this resolved from a defendant standpoint,” he said.
Perplexity said if Rogers grants Comet ML’s motion, it’d have to spend more than $2 million on rebranding and advertising.
Assmus said he wouldn’t give the alleged costs much weight if he were in Rogers’ place. Perplexity isn’t “a manufacturing business where they have a million units in inventory and they have to go cross off the old label and put on a new one,” he said, “they could change the name on the website in 10 seconds.”
The case is Comet ML Inc. v. Perplexity AI Inc., N.D. Cal., No. 25-cv-04088, hearing scheduled for 6/25/25.