JOOLA Didn’t Sue 11 Paddle Companies for Damages. They Sued to Control the Border.
On April 7, 2026, JOOLA filed a patent infringement case against eleven paddle brands — Franklin Sports, Proton Sports, RPM Pickleball, Engage Pickleball, Friday Labs, Diadem Sports, Facolos, ProXR Pickleball, Paddletek, Adidas Pickleball, and Volair — for allegedly copying its proprietary Propulsion Core technology.
The question everyone is asking is which brands got sued and what Propulsion Core does. That is the surface of the story.
The more important question is not what JOOLA is suing over. It is where. A district court filing gets you money. An ITC filing gets you the border. JOOLA could have had both. They chose one. That tells you everything about what they actually wanted.
Two Courts. Two Different Outcomes.
When a company believes its patent has been infringed it has a choice. It can file in district court and pursue financial damages — royalties, lost profits, compensation for harm. That is how most patent disputes work. The process is slow, often taking two to four years to reach a verdict, but the remedy is financial. You win, you get paid.
JOOLA did not file in district court. And that was a choice, not a constraint. They could have filed there — and pursued damages simultaneously alongside an ITC complaint. Companies do it regularly. JOOLA chose the ITC only.
JOOLA filed with the International Trade Commission. And that is a fundamentally different instrument with a fundamentally different outcome.
The ITC does not award damages. It cannot make JOOLA financially whole. What it can do — and what JOOLA is specifically seeking — is an exclusion order enforced by US Customs and Border Protection at American ports of entry. Not compensation after the fact. Blocked shipments before they arrive.
The ITC also moves significantly faster than district court — targeting a final determination within twelve to eighteen months rather than the multi-year timelines of district court litigation. And crucially it has jurisdiction over foreign manufacturers and importers that a domestic court cannot easily reach.
Why the Border Matters in Pickleball
To understand why border enforcement is the relevant prize here you need to understand where pickleball paddles come from.
JOOLA’s own complaint specifies that the accused paddles — from Franklin to RPM to multiple others on the list — are manufactured in China for importation into the US market. The supply chain for the accused products is import-dependent by JOOLA’s own account.
This supply chain has created a crisis that has been building for two years. Within weeks of major brands launching new technology — CRBN’s TruFoam after eighteen months of R&D and over two hundred prototypes, JOOLA’s own Perseus models, Selkirk’s premium lines — knockoff versions appear on Alibaba, Temu, and Facebook Marketplace. Some sell for seventeen dollars. They look nearly identical to the originals. They have never passed USA Pickleball testing. They enter the country through the same import pipeline as legitimate products.
The United Pickleball Association called the counterfeit paddle market an existential threat to the integrity, safety, and economics of the sport. The sport launched a consumer awareness campaign called Don’t Trust A Fake.
None of that stopped the flow. Because none of it addressed the pipeline.
The ITC addresses the pipeline.
What an Exclusion Order Actually Does
When the ITC issues an exclusion order US Customs and Border Protection receives enforcement instructions and updates its systems to flag matching shipments at ports of entry. Infringing goods are blocked before they reach the market — not pursued after they have already been sold.
JOOLA is seeking what is known as a Limited Exclusion Order — an instrument that applies specifically to the eleven named defendants and their imports of infringing products. This is an important legal distinction. A Limited Exclusion Order does not automatically sweep unnamed counterfeiters or every overseas manufacturer producing similar technology. Those parties are not named respondents and are not automatically covered.
However a Limited Exclusion Order does create something that did not previously exist — a CBP-enforced border mechanism with JOOLA’s Propulsion Core patents as the legal basis. It creates precedent. It produces the technical documentation — samples, descriptions, infringement criteria — that makes future enforcement arguments easier to build. And it sends a signal to the entire overseas manufacturing ecosystem that this technology is now actively defended at the border, not just in court.
If JOOLA subsequently argues that circumvention is occurring — that unnamed manufacturers are routing infringing products through alternative channels — they can pursue a General Exclusion Order that sweeps the broader import pipeline. That is not automatic from this filing. But this filing is how you build toward it.
The eleven brands named today are the beginning of this story. Not the end. Whether this filing is ultimately used to protect innovation, consolidate market power, or address the counterfeit crisis undermining the sport’s economics — or all three simultaneously — is the question the sport needs to keep asking.
The Brands Named in the Lawsuit
The eleven defendants are not knockoff merchants. They are Franklin Sports — one of the most accessible beginner brands in the sport, sold at Target and Dick’s Sporting Goods. Paddletek — a legacy manufacturer that helped build competitive pickleball. Engage — a brand with deep roots in the sport’s professional tier. Adidas Pickleball. Diadem. ProXR.
And Proton Sports — a company currently banned from all sanctioned professional play for unpaid debts, in active bankruptcy proceedings, whose athletes were told by the governing body to pursue unpaid sponsorship fees themselves. Suing a company already on its knees for patent infringement raises questions about whether every decision in this filing is as principled as the press release suggests.
Also named is Facolos — an emerging Vietnamese brand that recently signed top pro Gabe Tardio and is entering the US premium market with UPA-certified equipment. Facolos is not a knockoff operation. It is a legitimate competitor doing precisely what the sport’s global growth makes inevitable — Asian manufacturers building quality products, signing American pros, and competing for market share that US brands currently hold.
The inclusion of Facolos alongside Franklin alongside Proton in the same lawsuit tells you something about the breadth of what JOOLA is attempting to address with a single filing.
The Company Making This Argument
JOOLA’s CEO Richard Lee said in the company’s statement that the brands shaping the future of the sport are the ones willing to innovate on their own.
That is a position worth examining in full context.
JOOLA is the company that submitted deliberately toned-down versions of its Gen 3 paddles for USAP certification approval — then mass-produced significantly more powerful versions with reportedly double the foam and sold those to the public under the same approval stamp. USA Pickleball called it a classic bait-and-switch in its countersuit. JOOLA filed a two hundred million dollar lawsuit against USAP in response. A consumer class action was settled — three hundred dollars with proof of purchase, a hundred and fifty dollar gift code without. The lawsuit between JOOLA and USAP remains unresolved.
The Propulsion Core technology JOOLA is now defending in an ITC filing as the pinnacle of its innovation is the same technology at the centre of those proceedings.
A company can simultaneously be the victim of intellectual property theft and the subject of legitimate questions about its own conduct. Both things can be true. The sport deserves to hold both at once rather than accepting the press release version of either.
A company can simultaneously be the victim of intellectual property theft and the subject of legitimate questions about its own conduct. The sport deserves to hold both at once rather than accepting the press release version of either.
What Players Should Actually Watch For
The outcome of this case against the eleven named brands will matter — for supply, for pricing, for what paddles are available to buy in twelve months. If exclusion orders are issued against Franklin or Paddletek the beginner player reaching for an accessible paddle at a sporting goods store will feel it.
But the more significant development to watch is whether JOOLA moves to expand the scope of this filing. Whether the Limited Exclusion Order becomes the foundation for a General Exclusion Order argument. Whether the CBP enforcement mechanism built through this case gets applied to the broader counterfeit pipeline that has been the sport’s undeclared crisis for two years.
That is when this case stops being a dispute between established brands and becomes something that reshapes the entire import economy of pickleball equipment.
JOOLA didn’t sue for damages. They sued to control the border. They had both options. They chose one. Whether that control is ultimately used to protect innovation, consolidate market power, or address the counterfeit crisis undermining the sport’s economics — or all three simultaneously — is the question the sport needs to keep asking.
The eleven brands named today are the beginning of this story. Not the end.