Texas- from www.nydailynews.com – Interactive Life Forms LLC, maker of devices called Fleshlight and Sex-in-a-Can, filed patent-infringement complaints against 25 companies to stop sales of knockoff sex toys in the U.S. that use its technology.

Imports of the Handy Humper and Travel Honeypot brands should be banned because the products are among those that violate two Interactive Life patents, the company said in a complaint last week with the U.S. International Trade Commission in Washington. Closely held Interactive Life also filed a civil lawsuit in federal court in Austin, Texas, where it’s based.

The patents were issued in 1998 on a device shaped as a flashlight or thermos with elastomeric gel inside.

The complaint names seven manufacturers, 11 distributors and seven retailers that Interactive Life claims are selling the knockoffs, including California Exotic Novelties Inc.

in Chino, California, and Nanma Manufacturing Co. in Hong Kong. The companies aren’t licensed to use the elastomeric gel invention and aren’t paying royalties, according to the complaint.

Interactive Life said the case shouldn’t be limited to those companies and asked that the ITC ban imports of any unlicensed products made with the patented elastomeric gel.