Kobe Bryant and his legal team were going with a new game plan in their battle against Hi-Tech Pharmaceuticals for the right to use the name “Black Mamba.” Up until he was tragically killed in a freak helicopter crash yesterday.

TOP STORY — New details continue to emerge about the helicopter crash that killed NBA legend Kobe Bryant, his 13-year-old daughter Gianna and seven others in Calabasas, California, on Sunday afternoon.

As fans mourn the sudden death of one of the NBA’s iconic athletes, authorities are still in the early stages of investigating the crash and its potential causes — a process that could take several weeks.

Coincidentally, on January 6th 2020, Yahoo News published a recent report on Kobe Bryant and his long, drawn out legal battle with big pharma company Hi-Tech Pharmaceuticals. According to the Yahoo News report, Kobe Bryant was trying to hash out a settlement in the battle with a pharma company over “Black Mamba” before heading to trial.

The original report on the powerhouse lawsuit was made public by The Blast, on December 19th, 2019. According to court documents obtained by The Blast, the United States Patent and Trademark Office has shut down Bryant’s attempt to wrap up the case.

In his newest filings, Kobe was asking the trademark board to side with him once and for all. For the first time, Kobe has alleged Hi-Tech’s products contain substances banned by the FDA as a “dietary supplement.”

Kobe said he recently became aware of concerns “raised by both the FDA as well as the USPTO about the legality of the substances contained within the Product.”

He believed “the product, marketed and sought to be registered as a ‘dietary supplement,’ has contained and continues to contain prohibited substances by the FDA: DMAA and Methylsynephrine.”

Kobe Bryant wants the pharma company to be shut down from using “Black Mamba” ASAP.

Since the board wasn’t entirely convinced by Bryant’s arguments, they denied his motion for summary judgment. The case was heading to trial where they were intended to continue battling it out.

Back in 2015, the pharma company Hi-Tech Pharmaceuticals filed to trademark the name “Black Mamba HYPERRUSH” to use to sell a line of ephedra-based diet pills. Kobe’s team filed to trademark his “Black Mamba” name the year after Hi-Tech.

Bryant and the pharma company have been battling it out since 2017 after Bryant demanded their trademarks not be approved, fearing it would cause confusion with consumers. He argued most people connect him with “Black Mamba” He even pointed to Nike using “hyper” their products, which would cause confusion with the diet pill name.

Hi-Tech fired back to Bryant’s opposition, calling him a bully and accusing him of overreaching his trademark rights to maliciously block their trademark. The company argued another athlete, boxer Roger Mayweather, uses the “Black Mamba” nickname. He trademarked “Roger Black Mamba Mayweather” in 2013, and Hi-Tech believed that alone should kill Bryant’s opposition to their trademark.

Unfortunately, only weeks after Kobe’s lawsuit update from Yahoo News about the upcoming trial, Kobe Bryant was killed.

This is a Developing Story