The body of law drawn from the precedents set by earlier decisions.
In a recent decision from 1 October 2018 (B-2740-17) the Danish Eastern High Court affirmed a decision of the Danish Commercial Court from December 2017 (V-8-17) in which the court had ruled that a café in Copenhagen had infringed the trademark rights and copyrights to the character Obelix which rightfully belongs to Les Editions Albert…
In an opposition proceeding brought by Frito-Lay North America against Real Foods Pty Ltd., the Trademark Trial and Appeal Board properly determined that the marks CORN THINS and RICE THINS were highly descriptive of their respective goods—”crispbread slices predominantly of corn, namely popped corn cakes” and “crispbread slices primarily made of rice, namely rice cakes”—and…
The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit upheld the dismissal of a trademark infringement suit filed by a Nashville restaurant called “The Row Kitchen and Pub” against a competing restaurant named “Dierks Bentley’s Whiskey Row.” Although the restaurants were direct competitors serving tourists visiting Nashville’s Music Row; offered inexpensive, pub-style food and drinks…
This case is about the genuine use of shape marks. M J Quinlan & Associates PTY Ltd. of Australia own a 1999 registration for the shape of a kangaroo. The mark is protected for potato snacks and potato crisps. The plaintiff owns or owned a patent and design rights to the kangaroo-shaped crisps which were…
In February this year, the Swedish Patent and Market Court (“PMD”) ruled in favour of Volvo in a bad faith case regarding the mark “MADE BY SWEDEN” registered by Green Stapler. The mark Made by Sweden had been the centre of a campaign starring Swedish superstar football player Zlatan Ibrahimović and world-renowned Swedish artist Robyn…
A German company’s interactive website, through which it assisted customers with improving their software products, was sufficient to subject the company to federal personal jurisdiction for purposes of a trademark infringement suit brought by a Maine company that owned a federally registered mark, the U.S. Court of Appeals in Boston has ruled. The German company…
To ensure you don’t miss out on interesting IP law developments reported on our other IP blogs, we will, on a regular basis, provide you with an overview of the top 3 most-read posts from each of our IP law blogs. Here are the top posts from June, July and August. Top 3 Kluwer Copyright…
The Trademark Trial and Appeal Board did not err when it found that the WU DANG TAI CHI GREEN TEA mark was confusingly similar to the registered mark TAI CHI, according to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit. The Board’s findings as to the DuPont factors were supported by substantial evidence, in…
The Federal Administrative Court finds that APPLE cannot be protected as a trade mark for jewelry (cl. 14) and electronical toys including computer games (cl. 28). The Court says that the shape of an apple is of common use and understood as a reference to a feature of those products. The Institute for Intellectual Property…
The Court of Appeal of Arnhem/Leeuwarden, The Netherlands, in its decision of August 21, 2018 invalidated the Benelux trade mark registration of the so called S-shape for loosefill packing material (see below picture) because it consists exclusively of a shape that is necessary to obtain a technical result. The Court of Appeal…
