With the likelihood of a no deal scenario increasing as March 2019 draws closer, the UK Government has now published a series of papers detailing the likely ramifications of a such a Brexit. Of particular note, the Government has published papers discussing the likely treatment of trade marks and designs, copyright, patents, and exhaustion. With…
A string of recent UK IPO decisions indicates that the Tribunal is willing to take a holistic and pragmatic view to an alleged bad faith filing. Many readers will be familiar with Michael Gleissner, the infamous modern day trade mark troll. Gleissner’s conduct has been scrutinised in a plethora of trade mark and domain name…
In BASIC NET SpA vs EUIPO, (case C-547/17 of Sept. 6, 2018), shortly after the recent Nestlè/Mondelez KIT KAT case (C‑84/17P, C-85/17 P and C-95/17 P; see ‘CJEU on the Kit Kat shape and acquired distinctiveness of EU trade marks for shapes’ in this blog), the CJEU again tackled the issue of how and where…
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…
The Regional Court of Munich was asked to decide on the question if an application for action by a right holder, based on the Customs Enforcement Regulation No. 608/2013 (“Customs Enforcement Regulation”), constitutes a dishonest obstruction of a competitor’s business under German unfair competition law. The court rejected the claim arguing that the provisions of…
The debate about the traditional terms, such as “torta”, has occupied Spanish case law for a long time and now the saga continues on an EU level. The main discussion is about whether the expression “torta” can be classified as a Traditional Designation. Background: The Regulatory Body for the Protected Designation of Origin of Queso…
In a contribution published in Berichten IE 2018/4, De Brauw lawyers Tobias Cohen Jehoram, Carlos van Staveren and Renate Keijser analyse all IP rulings handed down by the Dutch Supreme Court this century. The analysis helps IP specialists identify the right strategy in choosing and formulating grounds when appealing to the Supreme Court and how…
Ukraine is actively working on the implementation of European standards of trademark protection and is making significant efforts to fill the lacunas of the current trademark system. As the system is developing we provide a short overview of abuse of rights to trademarks. Article 6 quinquies of the Paris Convention for the Protection of Industrial…
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…
