Law

The first nationwide case of unfair competition in anti dilution and protection of internationally renowned geographical indications - seizing the popularity of premium wine traffic? Cross boundaries cannot be changed!

2024-05-20   

Introduction: Grape wine with a luminous glass, if you want to drink the pipa, hurry up immediately. The cross-border creativity of "fine wine" paired with "steed", once projected from the romantic imagination of poetry into real marketing, requires careful consideration of whether it will break through the boundaries of laws and regulations. Recently, the Intermediate People's Court of Suzhou City, Jiangsu Province, concluded the unfair competition dispute case filed by the French National Cognac Industry Office against Fumou Automobile (China) Co., Ltd. and Changan Fumou Automobile Co., Ltd., and made a high compensation judgment of 2 million yuan in accordance with the law. This is the first domestic case of unfair competition dispute involving the anti dilution protection of internationally renowned geographical indications. The judgment accurately defines the rules and boundaries of competition behavior using internationally renowned geographical indications, resolutely stops unfair competition behavior that violates the principle of good faith and business ethics, and downplays internationally renowned geographical indications. It has been rated as one of the top ten intellectual property judgment cases with research value in China. When it comes to "Cognac", the first thing that most consumers think of is the famous French wine, and few people know that it is also a geographical indication protected by Chinese law. As early as 1987, the French government issued a decree on the French National Cognac Industry Office, aimed at formulating policies for cognac operators through industry associations, ensuring product quality and reputation, improving grape cultivation and winemaking techniques, promoting and promoting cognac, and striving to protect the relevant rights of geographical indication cognac worldwide. In 2009, the former General Administration of Quality Supervision, Inspection and Quarantine of China accepted the geographical indication registration application for Cognac from the French National Cognac Industry Office in accordance with the Regulations on the Protection of Geographical Indication Products, and approved the implementation of geographical indication protection for Cognac within China. This means that Cognac has become the first foreign geographical indication product to receive special protection in China, representing the quality of specific wines in France's legal production areas, and has a high level of popularity and influence among the relevant public. Since 2018, the French National Cognac Industry Office has found that Fumou Automobile (China) Company and Changan Fumou Automobile Company have named their cars "Cognac Special Edition" and named them "Cognac Brown" for the relevant car color scheme. At the same time, there has been a lot of related publicity on the internet. The plaintiff believes that the defendant's use of Cognac geographical indications for commercial promotion of the involved car constitutes unfair competition. Therefore, the plaintiff files a lawsuit requesting cessation of infringement, elimination of impact, and compensation for economic losses and reasonable expenses for rights protection totaling RMB 2 million. "The qualification of the litigation subject of the Cognac Industry Office is not qualified." The two defendants jointly argued during the trial that both the cognac text and the cognac version were used as descriptive colors. There is no commercial competition or commodity substitution relationship between the plaintiff and defendant. The two industries have significant differences, and there is no possibility of entering each other's industries in the short term, so there is no competitive relationship. To effectively fulfill the Paris Convention, it is necessary to clarify that the plaintiff in this case is a French entity and belongs to a foreign-related intellectual property infringement dispute. As the presiding judge of this case

Edit:Wangchen Responsible editor:Chenjie

Source:http://rmfyb.chinacourt.org

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