In December 2011, Research Affiliates, LLC filed a suit against WisdomTree in the United States District Court for the Central District of California, alleging that the fundamentally weighted investment methodology infringed three of plaintiff's patents. In November 2012, Research Affiliates announced that it will withdraw its patent infringement lawsuit and acknowledged that WisdomTree's fundamentally-weighted indexes and strategies were developed by WisdomTree independently of Research Affiliates. There is no guarantee that WisdomTree will not be subject to claims of infringement of third-party intellectual property rights in the future. This is important as WisdomTree's fundamentally-weighted indexes and strategies are important differentiating factors.