Delaware advertising firm Denizen has filed a lawsuit against JWT and their subsidiary WPP. Denizen claims that WPP stole one of their patented concepts. The patented product-placement concept that Denizen has was used by WPP for an advertisement that they made for Microsoft search engine Bing.com.
Around 2002 Denizen and WPP almost made a partnership. The talks about a partnership fell through late in 2006 but the two companies made a confidentiality agreement. Denizen is now accusing WPP of blending content and characters from the TV show “The Philanthropist” to promote Bing.com.
JWT was the company that Microsoft hired to handle the $100 million Bing.com marketing campaign. “WPP intends to solicit customers by continuing to use Denizen’s proprietary, trade secret information to solicit customers for WPP and its affiliates,” says Denizen’s complaint.
