The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit reversed a trial court’s ruling that JBLU, Inc. violated the Tariff Act of 1930 by importing jeans that were not properly marked with their country of origin (JBLU, Inc. v. United States, March 2, 2016, Moore, K.). Because the trial court erred in deferring to the…
In a recent decision, the Court of Appeal of The Hague concluded that there is a confusing similarity between Lacoste’s device mark consisting of a picture of a crocodile, registered for (among other things) cosmetic products in class 3, and the word mark EAU CROCO for the same products. The case concerned an application by…
On February 24, 2016, the General Court dismissed an action of the Coca-Cola Company and confirmed the decisions of OHIM and the Board of Appeal (case R 540/2013-2) by ruling that the known shape of the contour bottle of Coca-Cola without fluting lacks distinctive character and is thus not registerable as a 3D-Community trademark (GC…
To ensure you don’t miss out on interesting IP law developments reported by our Patent and Copyright Law bloggers, we will, on a regular basis, provide you with an overview of the top 3 most-read posts from each of the blogs. Top 3 Kluwer Patent Blog posts in February 2016 1) Growing pressure on EPO president…
The dispute started with the termination of a license contract by which Együd Garage was entitled to use Daimler AG’s trade mark “Mercedes-Benz” and to describe itself as ‘felhatalmazott Mercedes Benz szerviz’ (‘authorised Mercedes-Benz dealer’) in its own online (www.telefonkonyv.hu) advertisements ordered from the Hungarian Phonebook Company (MTT). Despite the request of Együd Garage to…
The scope of protection conferred upon trade mark owners can often prove to be a controversial subject, particularly where the trade mark applied for has a decorative look and feel to it. Despite the EU trade mark system now being over 20-years-old, and case law well-established, it is an issue that shows no sign of…
The Schogetten chocolate cases from Germany and Hungary are an example of how differently courts in the member states can still interpret what is essentially the same trademark. This blog deals with the Schogetten chocolate case in Germany (Higher Regional Court Cologne, 15 August 2014 – 6 U 9/14) and Hungary (Fővárosi Törvényszék – 2015….
The Alicante Appellate Court has confirmed that the use of lists comparing fragrances to well-known perfume brands is illegal. Comparison lists compare smell-alike perfumes with the respective high-priced original perfume brand. These lists are distributed among retailers to inform customers of the “equivalence” between their fragrances and the well-known brand. Lately, retailers have been using…
The maker of Gibson-brand guitars could not go forward with claims that media conglomerate Viacom International secondarily infringed trademarks related to Gibson’s “Flying V” design by selling a ukulele with a V-shaped body and bearing Viacom’s “SpongeBob SquarePants” and Nickelodeon trademarks, the U.S. Court of Appeals in San Francisco has held (Gibson Brands, Inc. v….
The Portuguese market has been recently overrun by new brands and stores of “low-cost” perfumes. Their business relies on the idea of selling low-cost versions of the original perfumes, identified only by the olfactory families; the business model implicitly and explicitly presupposes that such perfumes are marketed as corresponding to the bestselling perfumes, in terms…
