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| The Insta360 Luna. |
In a dramatic escalation of intellectual property tensions, Insta360 has fired back at drone giant DJI just hours after being sued on the launch day of its new Luna Ultra camera. The response? Two aggressive countersuits filed in the US, accusing DJI of infringing five of its core utility patents across multiple product lines.
What was meant to be a triumphant debut for Insta360’s flagship handheld gimbal quickly turned into a legal battlefield. On June 10, DJI timed its patent infringement lawsuit to coincide precisely with the official launch of the Luna Ultra – a move Insta360 now calls an anti-competitive “ambush” designed to disrupt its big moment and scare off potential customers.
But instead of retreating, Insta360 has gone on the offensive. According to a recent PR Newswire release, the company filed two separate countersuits in the United States, alleging that DJI has been illegally using Insta360’s patented technologies for years – across some of DJI’s most beloved and bestselling product families.
A Calculated Strike Meets a Furious Response
DJI’s original lawsuit sought a permanent injunction to ban the Insta360 Luna Ultra from the US market entirely. That would have been a devastating blow to the product’s North American prospects, especially given the hype surrounding its unique head-tracking POV capabilities.
But Insta360 isn’t playing defense. In its countersuits, the company claims DJI has violated five utility patents covering a range of essential camera functions:
- Gimbal stabilization technology – the very foundation of smooth handheld footage
- Directional control interfaces – how users intuitively steer camera movement
- Smooth camera stabilization algorithms – beyond basic gimbal work
- Telemetry data overlays – used for speed, altitude, and motion graphics
- Panoramic video stabilization – critical for 360-degree content
According to the legal complaints, these patented innovations appear throughout DJI’s catalog – not just in a single product, but across the Osmo Pocket series (DJI’s own compact gimbals), the Ronin and RS professional stabilizer lines, the Osmo Mobile smartphone gimbals, and even the Osmo 360 camera.
“We Let Our Products Do the Talking – But We Won’t Back Down”
In a public statement, Insta360 Founder JK Liu made the company’s position unmistakably clear:
“While we prefer to let our products speak for themselves, we are fully committed to protecting our innovations and defending our intellectual property. We did not start this fight, but we will not be intimidated by launch-day legal tactics designed to scare creators away from a genuinely superior product.”
Liu’s frustration is palpable. He argues that DJI’s decision to file suit on launch day – rather than months earlier when the Luna Ultra was first announced – betrays a deeper anxiety: fear of facing a truly competitive product in the handheld gimbal space.
A Product Years in the Making
Insta360 has categorically rejected DJI’s claim that the Luna Ultra copied the architecture of the Osmo Pocket series. The company insists the camera has a “completely unique engineering footprint” and represents the culmination of independent R&D that began as early as 2020.
According to Liu, the Luna Ultra’s design and core technology evolved naturally from earlier in-house innovations, including:
- The modular ONE R camera system
- The Link series of AI-powered webcams
- The Flow smartphone gimbals
In other words, Insta360 argues that the Luna Ultra didn’t come out of nowhere – it’s the latest step in a long, documented lineage of original engineering. The company has promised to provide evidence of its development timeline in court.
Consumer Demand Defies Legal Drama
Despite the immediate legal friction – or perhaps because of the publicity – the Luna Ultra has landed with a splash. Insta360 reports that within its first 24 hours of availability, the device became the top-selling product in Amazon’s camcorder category across North America.
That’s no small feat for a niche POV head-tracker aimed at creators, vloggers, and action-sports enthusiasts. The company has assured customers that it remains fully committed to ensuring the Luna Ultra stays available for purchase while the legal battle unfolds. No recalls, no pulled listings – at least for now.
The Political Irony No One Can Ignore
Here’s where the story takes a strange twist. The entire dispute is starting to look like an intense corporate catfight – but one dripping with political irony that neither company can afford to ignore.
Thanks to escalating US government restrictions and standing executive orders that effectively target DJI over its alleged ties to the Chinese state, the drone giant’s ability to freely sell new hardware in the American market has already been severely choked. In practice, DJI faces significant hurdles – including potential import bans and commercial restrictions – that limit its US presence.
That raises a glaring question about the validity of DJI’s lawsuit: if a company can barely sell its own competing products in the region, what actual “damages” can it realistically claim to have lost to a rival like Insta360?
Legal analysts point out that patent infringement lawsuits typically require the plaintiff to demonstrate concrete harm – lost sales, market share erosion, or licensing revenue. But if DJI’s own US sales are already hamstrung by government actions, proving those damages becomes far more complicated.
For now, with a restricted DJI aggressively trying to leverage American courts to kneecap an unhindered competitor, we will just have to wait and see how all this pans out in front of a judge. One thing is certain: the handheld gimbal market just became a legal war zone, and creators are caught in the middle.
Source: PR Newswire