An Eleventh Circuit panel grilled lawyers for two battery makers butting heads in a trademark dispute over the purchase of Amazon.com keyword search terms over whether “battery tender” was generic or protected.

Gregory A. Castanias of Jones Day, representing appellant NOCO Co., argued a Florida district court jury had erred in finding the company owed Deltona Transformer Corp. nearly $20 million because the search keyword term “battery tender” it purchased wasn’t a protectable trademark and hadn’t caused actual confusion.

Judge Kevin Christopher Newsom pushed back on the Castanias’ argument that the term was generic and didn’t qualify for any trademark …