Un peu d'actu juridique...

[Invité]

Eh oui, dans le cadre de mon job, il m'arrive de voir passer des actus qui concernent VW...
Celle-ci est toute récente, et semble indiquer que VW, propriétaire de la marque "GTI", n'a pas suffisamment défendu cette marque dans le passé. Aujourd'hui, c'est devenu un terme générique, et VW vient de se faire annoncer qu'il ne peut plus la protéger, sauf si cela crée une véritable confusion pour le consommateur... Or, Suzuki, en l'espèce, a déposé une marque "Swift GTI", qui ne peut induire le consommateur en erreur.
Il s'avère donc que si VW avait empêché toute utilisation des lettres GTI depuis 1976, cette marque resterait aujourd'hui à son seul usage. Une leçon à retenir pour VW et pour tout propriétaire d'une marque distinctive.
(Sorry, c'est en anglais...)



In 1976 Volkswagen introduced the GOLF GTI. A sporty car
which acquired an enormous popularity. Volkswagen registered the letter
combination GTI as a trademark in several countries. In 2003 Suzuki
applied for a mark SWIFT GTi. Volkswagen pointed out that she was the
owner of the mark GTI and opposed the application in the name of Suzuki.

Last week the European Court of Justice declared that the use of
SWIFT GTi does not infringe the trademark rights from Volkswagen. The
risk of confusion between the mark from Volkswagen and the mark from
Suzuki is not likely according tot the European Court of Justice.

It is relevant to note that some other car manufacturers as Peugeot,
Nissan, Citroën and Toyota also used GTI on a range of cars produced by
them. The mark GTI is not very distinctive according to the European
Court of Justice. The fact that Suzuki is using the combination GTI in
combination with the fancy name SWIFT counters the similarity between
the respective marks. Consumers would not assume that all vehicles,
parts and accessories come from the same manufacturer simply on the
basis of the use of the letters GTI.

A lesson that can be learned from this ruling of the European Court
of Justice is that the owner of a trademark registration has to defend
its trademark because if he does not do that, he may loose its rights to the
mark. It starts with the choice of a distinctive trademark. Then a
trademark owner has to defend its trademark against the use of similar
signs by third parties to avoid that the trademark becomes a generic
term.