Showing posts with label trademark. Show all posts
Showing posts with label trademark. Show all posts

May 16, 2013

Chinese Playboy (Pfulyboy) Shirts

Thursday, May 16, 2013
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Chinese consumers are obsessive about brands and the popularity of Western luxury and lifestyle brands is high (although slightly decreasing lately). A week ago, I passed by a small clothing store in Xiamen with a big sale sign in front and decided to take a look. At first glance I didn't pay much attention to the brand since I'm a pretty brand unconscious shopper, but it didn't take long for me to see that I was about to buy some pfamous (typo intended) brand shirts. 

Yes, that's right, not Playboy but Pfulyboy
There are actually lots of stores in China called Playboy, but instead of selling anything to do with nude women, they sell clothes. In fact, I'd guess that the majority of Chinese people (other than some boys/men who spend too much time online) have no idea of what the Playboy brand means to the rest of the world. Instead, the brand is so popular because of the bunny logo - cute sells here in China and throughout most of Asia (to adults as well as children) as the Hello Kitty phenomenon firmly established years ago.
Playboy logo
Pfulyboy logo on the shopping bag
I imagine Playboy licenses the use of its very famous trademarked name and bunny logo to various clothing companies and retail outlets. I also imagine that Pfulyboy is a Chinese attempt to avoid licensing and related legal concerns. In China, just about any famous brand is copied or mimicked and Hugh Hefner's venerable bunny brand is no exception. Since trademark laws are much more flexible here in China than the U.S. (and rarely enforced), Pfulyboy might be a perfectly legal brand. For me, the purchase decision turned on finding what seem to be some decent quality shirts at a pretty low price. So sorry Hef, I'm afraid I'm not much of a Playboy, but possibly more a Pfulyboy.

Dec 7, 2011

iPad Trademark Confusion in China

Wednesday, December 07, 2011
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A Chinese court recently ruled against Apple Inc. in a dispute over the right to sell computer products bearing the name "iPad" in China. Apple had sued a Taiwan-based technology company, accusing it of infringing its trademark in the iPad name. According to the United States Code (and most countries' trademark laws), a trademark is "any word, name, symbol, or design, or any combination thereof, used in commerce to identify and distinguish the goods of one manufacturer or seller from those of another and to indicate the source of the goods." So, the name iPad for example, can be a trademark that identifies computers or computer-related devices.

While Apple owns a trademark for the name "iPad" in the United States and most of the world, it is uncertain whether it owns the same right in China. A Chinese company, Proview Technology, claims that it registered the iPad name as a trademark in 2000 in Taiwan and 2001 in mainland China, several years before Apple started selling its iPads. In China, as in most countries, whoever obtains a registration for a trademark first generally owns the right to use the registered mark (such as the name iPad) in that country.
If Proview's claim is true and its products sold using the iPad trademark are similar to Apple's iPad device, Apple faces a serious obstacle in continuing to sell iPads in China. Apple products are very popular in China and there is a huge amount of market growth in China that Apple surely wants to continue taking advantage of.
Apple iPads already dominate the market for tablet PCs in China
If Apple is infringing Proview's trademark, it would not only be liable for monetary compensation, but would also be prohibited from using the name iPad in China. Apple would still be able to sell iPads, but would have to do so under a different name. If Proview's trademark claim is legitimate as it seems it may be, I suspect that rather than selling iPads under another name, Apple might ultimately agree to buy the rights to the iPad name from Proview. In fact, Apple previously bought rights from Proview to the iPad name in Taiwan and several other Asian countries in which Proview had registered the trademark, but this purchase did not seem to include mainland China. So it appears that Apple may have to pay big bucks to keep selling iPads as "iPads" in China.

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