The US District Court for the Western District of Pennsylvania has dismissed a lawsuit filed by Vertical Bridge REIT, LLC and its subsidiaries against Everest Infrastructure Partners, Inc., without prejudice.

Filed in June 2023, Vertical Bridge had accused Everest of trade secret misappropriation, violations of the Lanham Act, plus other claims, all of which were dismissed by Judge W. Scott Hardy, as reported by Wireless Estimator.

The lawsuit was filed by K&L Gates law firm on behalf of its client Vertical Bridge, alleging that EIP Holdings and Everest implemented a scheme to unlawfully misappropriate trade secret information.

Vertical Bridge accused Everest of unfair business practices in the telecommunications infrastructure industry, alleged that Everest engaged in false advertising under the Lanham Act, and interfered with contractual and prospective business relations.

According to telecommunications towers owner Vertical Bridge, Everest had unlawfully orchestrated a scheme to gain market share at Vertical's expense.

In the filing, Vertical Bridge previously said: "Everest… deploys a form of tower aggregation made possible only by unlawful misappropriation of trade secrets in order to tortiously interfere with existing VB contracts."

However, last week Hardy concluded that the claims made by Vertical Bridge were insufficiently pleaded under the Lanham Act and for trade secret misappropriation.

Judge Hardy also stated that Vertical Bridge failed to demonstrate that Everest made false or misleading statements about goods or services. The court decided that the allegations were too vague and did not provide specific instances of false advertising.

Because Judge Hardy has dismissed the case without prejudice, Vertical Bridge can amend its complaint to focus on the deficiencies identified by the court instead.