IP Law Daily, COPYRIGHT—D. Me.: Protectable authorship or trivial ‘bug fixes’? A jury will have to decide, (Feb 10, 2026)

By Matthew Hersh, J.D.

In a dispute over allegedly unlawful use of software, copyright as well as contract breach claims will have to be decided at trial.

A federal jury will have to decide whether a software company that offers data management services to veterinarians exceeded the scope of its license with another software vendor, the federal court for the District of Maine has held. The court, in denying summary judgment on the contract breach claim, also found that a jury would have to decide whether the copyright registration for the version of the software at issue included genuinely original content or merely trivial “bug fixes” that were not protectable by copyright law (Covetrus, Inc. v. Actian Corp., No. 2:21-cv-00097-SDN (D. Me. Feb. 6, 2026)).

The lawsuit involves a dispute between California-based Actian and Kentucky-based Veterinary Data Services, or VDS. Actian is a computer software company whose products focus on data management and integration and analytics. One of the software products Actian develops is DataConnect, also referred to as Data Integrator. VDS is in the business of providing data integration, conversion, and support services to third-party vendors that serve the veterinary industry. Since 2006, it has licensed various versions of DataConnect from Actian,

The dispute arose out of a 2019 sales order by which VDS agreed to extend its license of DataConnect through 2020. Actian accused VDS, after an audit, of exceeding the terms of the license and infringing upon Actian’s copyright. VDS and Covetrus filed a lawsuit against Actian in the Maine federal court, seeking a declaration of non-infringement. Actian responded by filing a counterclaim asserting copyright infringement and breach of contract.

Both parties moved for summary judgment, leading to this opinion.

Copyright infringement. The court found that a jury would have to decide whether VDS infringed upon any rights Actian held in the software that it licensed for the year 2020. Actian registered that version of the software, known as Version 9, over the course of three different registration filings in 2020 and 2023. But the parties disputed, the court noted, whether the source code of Version 9 contained original, protectable authorship or consisted merely of trivial “bug fixes.” If the changes are “found to be trivial,” the court noted, “the copyright registration could be invalid, barring an infringement claim for that specific version.” A jury would have to make that determination.

Breach of contract. The court issued a mixed ruling on whether VDS breached its contract. One of Actian’s claims was that VDS failed to meet its contractual obligation to purchase support services for any outdated version of the software that remained covered by a license. But that claim would fail under a plain reading of the agreement, the court found. The support policy that purportedly imposed this obligation was not included within the terms of the sales order for the 2020 product. Rather, the sales order merely contained a clause reading “Actian Corporation Support Policy” and providing a link. This sales order language, the court found, “does not indicate an intent to be bound by the Support Policy.” The policy could not therefore be binding.

As to the other contractual claims, however, the court found that a jury would eventually have to decide them. One issue, for example, was whether VDS breached the agreement by using the software to ingest and migrate data for third-party veterinary offices, thus acting as essentially an unauthorized “middleman.” The agreement provided that VDS could not “use, access, or allow access” to the software to provide services to third parties. Here, VDS did provide services to third parties that involved the software, but the third parties did not have access to that software itself. Did that kind of use—for the benefit of third parties, but without third party direct access to the software—constitute the kind of “use” prohibited by the agreement? The language was too ambiguous to decide as a matter of law, the court found.

The court reached a similar conclusion about whether VDS had over-deployed the software. Actian argued that VDS installed the software on 21 host computers, rather than the three which VDS had licensed. But the agreement language did not refer to a limit on the number of computers, but rate “cores.” This presented “a material dispute” regarding the technical industry standards in 2008, the year in which VDS first entered into a contract with Actian. “If ‘CPUs’ and ‘cores’ were treated as synonymous at the time,” the court noted, “VDS’s installation on 112 cores would constitute a breach of its three-CPU license. But, if the terms are distinct, VDS may have been in compliance.” A jury would have to decide this too.

The application of the statute of limitations, too, would have to be decided at trial. VDS argued that the claim was time-barred because Actian had sufficient information to warrant an investigation of alleged over-deployment as early as 2006. Actian argued, by contrast that it only discovered the “true infringement” in 2021 and that VDS affirmatively concealed its deployment scope during a 2017 audit. “A factfinder must decide if and when Actian had enough information to warrant an investigation into VDS’s use of the Software and if VDS affirmatively concealed any deployment to determine whether estoppel applies,” the court concluded.

The Case is No. 2:21-cv-00097-SDN.

Judge: Neumann, S.

Attorneys: Brian Strand (Spencer Fane LLP) for Covetrus Inc. Adam J. Reis (Hatch Law PC) for Actian Corp.

Companies: Covetrus Inc.; Actian Corp.

Cases: Copyright MaineNews