Sound Board

Our thoughts and views on the practice of Intellectual Property in India and around the world.

In the world of construction, an architect holds a remarkable position. An architect quite often turns to be the ultimate decision maker on any project, a question then arises would that give, the architect, as the creator and legal ‘author’ of a building a ‘right to object’ to the modification or destruction of their work by the owner of the building? In a recent judgment, the Delhi High Court has answered the question in negative.

A classic examples of legal fakes is the case of Supreme Italia, a company that has established its presence depending solely on the concept of legal fakes. The strategy that was adopted by the brand was to simply target the less informed customers into believing that it was dealing in products that were from the original brand Supreme.

The name Adidas is not new, and neither are its products. But in a major twist and what appears to be a blow, the European Court has ruled that the “three stripes” brand/trademark of Adidas was not distinctive enough.

Section 9 per se is not an easy provision to get through, laying down several criteria for determining if a trademark is entitled to be accepted. While Section 9(1) is the most common provision one can perceive in an examination report, Section 9(2) is a provision which leaves no stones unturned.

Justice Midha, in his order dated May 28, 2019, reiterated the mandatory nature of Section 25(3) of the Trademarks Act, 1999. As we have noted before, the Registrar is obligated to send a notice regarding the expiry of validity of a mark to its proprietor, before the said expiry.

The three WIPO Agreements have received accession from the Indian Government.[1]The three Agreements were introduced through the WIPO treaties primarily to ease the search for trademarks and industrial designs. In this arena it is significant to understand the prominence of all the three Agreements. A brief understanding of all the three Agreements are as follows:

When the use of the hashtag trademark suggests any sort of connection or link with the trademark owner or creates a likelihood or association with the trademark owner, then there maybe be grounds for infringement

One of the significant judgements from the recent time is the order of the Delhi High Court in the popular Crocs case. In an order dated March 6, 2019, the Court rejected the maintainability of a suit for passing off, in the case of a registered design. It is important to note here that the Plaintiff had brought this suit after the Court had previously rejected its previous suit for infringement of its registered design, holding that the same was invalid on the ground of prior publication

Canada has announced that the anticipated changes to the Trademarks Act will finally be coming into force on June 17, 2019. The changes are expected to simplify the domestic registration process and provide access to e international registration process administered by the World Intellectual Property Organization

Cadbury in 1995 filed an application to claim rights over the colour mark for the shade Pantone 2685 C. Cadbury’s 1995 (original) application was filed only for chocolates in a bar or tablet form with a description of the colour mark: “The mark consists of the colour Purple (Pantone 2685C) as shown on the form of the application, applied to the whole visible surface, or being the predominant colour applied to the whole visible surface, of the packaging of the goods.”