The body of law drawn from the precedents set by earlier decisions.
The Austrian Supreme Court (short “the Court”) recently ruled that a provider of maintenance and repair services for cars of all brands (short “garage”), including Mazda cars, where that service provider is in no business relationship with the brand owner, may not use figurative marks to indicate its services, but only the word mark (decision…
In December 2015 the Danish Maritime and Commercial High Court granted a preliminary injunction against citations and the use of metatags in a remarkable case between Karnov (Thomson Publishing) and Schultz – two providers of online databases of Danish case law. The case is an example of how metatags used together with citations of case…
The Higher District Court of Cologne held in preliminary injunction proceedings that use of a distinctive trademark on amazon.de for displaying other comparable products not originating from the trademark owner may be a trademark infringement (decision of 20 November 2015 on Case 6 U 40/15). The case concerned a practice of Amazon on its German…
The Swedish Court of Patent Appeals invalidated the registration of BERGLÖFSLÅDAN and BERGLÖFSLÅDAN ORIGINAL (in English the “BERGLOF BOX”) based on bad faith because of the trademark proprietor’s knowledge of the common use of these terms by other parties in Sweden. The case concerns the Swedish trademark registrations BERGLÖFSLÅDAN and BERGLÖFSLÅDAN ORIGINAL (in English the “BERGLOF…
Whether use of a trade mark in just one Member State is sufficient or not to support the validity of a CTM is an issue practitioners and Courts have struggled with since the CTM system began. The issue was addressed by the CJEU in their decision in ONEL back in 2012. Yet MINT, one of the first UK IPO…
On 20 January 2016, the Chancery Division of the High Court issued its judgment on the latest appeal concerning Nestlé’s attempt to register the 3D shape of its four-fingered bar. Sadly for Nestlé, in a double blow, Mr Justice Arnold dismissed their appeal against an earlier decision to refuse the registration of their shape mark…
The Swedish Supreme Court has requested a preliminary ruling from the CJEU in respect of an infringement case involving a CTM in Sweden. The case involves the Swedish insurance company Länsförsäkringar AB (“LF”) who claimed that the Estonian construction company Matek A/S (“Matek”) infringed LF’s CTM through its use of a similar trademark . The CTM…
Florida businessman Steven S. West was liable for over $913,000 in damages for infringing a service mark held by Omaha-based construction and mining company Kiewit Sons’, Inc., the U.S. Court of Appeals in St. Louis has decided (Peter Kiewit Sons’, Inc. v. Wall Street Equity Group, Inc., January 6, 2016, Kelly, J.). A federal district…
The Board of Directors of Sapphire Bay Condominiums West was unable to state Lanham Act claims against a disgruntled condominium owner who operated a website to complaint about the Board, according to the U.S. Court of Appeals in Philadelphia (The Board of Directors of Sapphire Bay Condominiums West v. Simpson, December 21, 2015, McKee, T.)….
An individual was in violation of a permanent injunction barring him from using BMW’s “MINI” trademarks in connection with an online store selling apparel bearing the brand name “Mini Works,” the U.S. Court of Appeals in San Francisco has held. The court also affirmed an order amending the injunction to require the individual to transfer…
