The brand Emami is a well known name in the FMCG(Fast Moving Consumer Goods) sector in India. Recently, Emami had levelled accusations against Patanjali Ayurved Limited of copying the design as well as the trademark of its ‘Kesh King’ brand of hair tonic.
Emami had launched the product 'Kesh King' in the year 2015. This product was developed by Sanjeev Kumar Juneja of SBS Biotech in the year 2008. The product was being sold and marketed through SBS Biotech of…
Toyota, one of the leading giants in the automobile industry, sensed a huge relief when the Delhi High Court on 8th of July, 2016 delivered its judgment in its favour. This trademark dispute was pending in the court for seven long years, before the court found the defendants conduct to be dishonest.
The Delhi High Court in the case of Toyota Jidosha Kabushiki Kaisha vs Deepak Mangal & Ors., CS (OS) 2490 of 2009, also known as the Prius Trademark…
Trademarks are known as business identifiers and they play an indispensable role in the growth of a particular business. With the globalization of markets , growing importance of brand advertising for manufacturers and subsequent brand awareness of consumers, trademarks have become increasingly important and valuable. Trade marks are crucial trading instruments because consumers ascertain the quality and standard of goods and services with the trade source.While trademark laws provide monopoly rights to the proprietor of a mark to use…
We’ve got some sad news for our FC Barcelona fans. The General Court of the European Union recently ruled against the football club FC Barcelona and in favour of an American fashion company named Kule, affirming a previous decision, that the football club had failed to prove the genuine use of the mark ‘Cule’.
For all our non-football fans, ‘Cule’ means a fan or supporter of the FC Barcelona. The issue first came up in 2011, when Kule had…
A conflict for the protection of intellectual property right arose recently in China when a Chinese based Infrastructure Company, Wanda Company diversified its business and entered in to a theme based park. It is interesting to note how the conflict arose in this case. The facts are as follows: on the inauguration of the theme park of Wanda Group on 28th May 2016, few people who were alleged to be workers of the park, were seen clad in Captain America,…
India approved its first ever Intellectual Property Rights (IPR) policy on 13th May 2016 with a vision to stimulate creativity and innovation and to promote advancement in science and technology, art and culture, traditional knowledge and biodiversity resources.
The policy lays out seven broad objectives and they are as follows:
Awareness: outreach and promotion;
Generation of IPRs;
Legal and legislative framework;
Administration and management;
Commercialization of IPR;
Enforcement…
You win some, you lose some!! China passed two judgments last week, with respect to trademark involving two of the most famous brands- “iPhone” and “Facebook”. The judgments are very surprising because as we all know that Facebook though blocked in China, was allowed the trademark protection. However, iPhone despite being popular and sold in China lost the trademark battle.
The iPhone imbroglio:
Xintong Tiandi, a Chinese manufacturer of luxury leather goods has been selling handbags, mobile phone…
Cybersquatting is no stranger to us, considering the increasing number of cybersquatting incidents that have come to light in the recent years. Cybersquatting is registering, using or selling of a domain name with the intention of benefiting from the name, popularity or goodwill of another’s business, trademark or brand. The Anti-Cybersquatting Consumer Protection Act (ACPA) has been established in the United States to protect the trademark owners from the unlawful actions of cybersquatters. The Act prohibits such practice as registering…
BlackBerry Vs Typo Products
BlackBerry Ltd. on 3rd January, 2014, filed a case against Typo Products LLC, in the California Northern District Court, for design infringement of their famous QWERTY keyboard.
The subject matter of the case alleged by BlackBerry is based on the design of a keyboard that can be snap-fitted on to an iPhone, so as to make it look like the BlackBerry keyboard. The design was claimed to be an infringement of U.S. Design Patent No. D685,775…
This post brings to light some of the Indian cases dealing with trademark infringement in the automobile industry.
The first case that would be discussed here is that of Tata Motors. The story starts in mid 2014, when Tata Motors approached the Court of Chief Metropolitan Magistrate, Vidya Prakash, complaining of some unknown persons engaged in the business of manufacturing, trading, distributing, storing and selling counterfeit and spurious products under the trademark of ‘Tata Motors’.
Tata Motors informed the Court…