IPR NEWS – WEEKLY UPDATES FROM 7TH AUG-13TH AUG
DFM FOODS LIMITED v. CHANDEL STORE & ORS.
The plaintiff is the owner of the registered trademark of ‘CRAX CURLS’ and ‘CURLS’ which is a type of corn-based snack launched in December 2016. The plaintiff alleged that the defendant even though changed their trademark from ‘CURLS’ TO ‘KURVY’, the packaging of the same, both before and after name change is deceptively similar with that of the plaintiffs. The Court held that the plaintiff has prima facie case in their favor because customers can easily be confused and cheated since the goods are of low price. Therefore, restrained the defendant from using an identical, similar mark, similar packaging with that of the plaintiff until further orders.
SEAN HALL V. TAYLOR SWIFT
Taylor Swift in a recent declaration against the copyright infringement levied against her by the songwriters of the Band 3LW in 2017, declared that she couldn’t have copied the lyrics of “players gonna play,” featured in her song “Shake It Off’ from the Band 3LW’s hit song, “Playas Gon’ Play” because she had never heard the song before. At the time of release of Band 3LW’s song in 2001, she claims that she was only a 11-year-old child, a devotee of country music and her parents never allowed her to see the ‘TRL’ count down show in MTV until she was 13-year-old. The lyrics are commonly used phrases in her life and denied any form of infringement by stating she made ‘fair use’ under copyright law. This case was dismissed in favour of Taylor Swift but was re-instated again by an appeal petition after the 9th Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals felt that the plaintiffs may have a chance that the lyrics are original to be copyright protected.
GOOGLE LLC V. SONOS INC.,
In a long list of patent infringement cases levied by Google and Sonos against each other on speaker tech patents, Google LLC on 8 th August 2022 filed two suits for patent infringement against Sonos Inc. in California Federal Court. The plaintiff alleges that Sonos Inc.’s audio player with voice-control; technology has infringed upon Google’s three patents. The lawsuit alleged that Sonos had used the technologies created and invented by Google in its new voice- control assistant feature whereby products are controlled through the help of ‘hotwords’ and also alleged four patent infringement by Sonos’s other products like Sonos Move, Roam, Roam SL, Arc, Beam, and One.
NOKIA V. OPPO
This case was filed by Nokia after the expiry of 4G agreement between the parties and there is non-consensus in the price dealings for renewal. The Munich Regional Court ruled in favour of Nokia that Oppo has infringed two of Nokia’s standard essential patents bearing the number EP 193 for protection of lag estimation in audio signals and EP 197 which provides the method for effective discontinuous communication. The Court further issued cease and desist to the subsidiaries of Oppo, i.e. Reflection Investment and OnePlus. Following this ruling, Oppo has stopped selling their products and withdrew from the German Market.
CANADA MOVES TO AMEND COPYRIGHT LAW
The Canadian innovation minister François-Philippe Champagne along with the heritage minister Pablo Rodriguez are working together to reform the copyright laws of Canada thereby helping artists to gain benefit and profits from reselling of their works and also enable artists who are generally below poverty line and working in remote areas get their fair share from galleries who resell their work. Canadian nonprofit CARFAC, which is an association for the visual artists, are lobbying for atleast 5% of the creation’s value on resale to the artists, thereby strengthening the resale rights for artists.
NEW SPACE POLICY FOR INDIA
Indian Space Association (ISpA) chairman Jayant Patil in a recent meeting with start-ups and investors had said that the question of Intellectual property rights is one of the greater problems that looms over the startup industry in the space sector. The question of who will own the IP, either the government or the startup and what percentage is a main factor for privatization of space sector. ‘Clarity on issues of IP’ is a main factor for the success of startups in space sector.
AMAZON.COM INC., ET AL. V. KEXLEWATERFILTERS, ET AL
Amazon’s Counterfeit Crimes Unit has joined hands with General Electric (GE) and GE Appliances, a Haier Company, to initiate a trademark infringement against the defendants who are cheating the customers by misrepresentation and attempting to sell fake GE-branded water filters in the Amazon platform. Amazon had earlier detected and removed the counterfeit product from the supply chain and sent to GE for verification. The fake products were blocked from being sold from the respective accounts and issued refunds to customer irrespective of whether the same was sold by Amazon or by a third party.
DISNEY AND DIVX SIGN IP LICENSE AGREEMENT
The Walt Disney Company has signed an IP license agreement with DivX, LLC which is a brand leader in digital video technology, having multiple streaming services like Disney+, Hulu, and ESPN+. DivX has the specialty to reduce the size of files when it is being sent to the people’s devices from the servers and licenses video patents to latest electronics and other streaming platforms. This agreement will help Disney to benefit out of DivX’s portfolio of video technology patents.
GI APPLICATION FILED FOR ‘Tirangi burfi’
The tri-color sweet which originated from Kashi, a sweet- weapon depicting the Indian Flag, as part of the Quit India Movement, is filed for Geographical Indication amidst the celebration of 75 years of India’s independence. The GI application was filed on 8 th august 2022 by the Mahanagar Udyog Vyapar Samiti, the apex body of local traders’ association.
INTEL TRANSFERS PATENT ASSETS TO IPValue
IPValue Management Group, Inc. has entered into an agreement with Intel which involves the transfer of nearly 5000 patent assets to Tahoe Research Limited. This agreement helps in the extension of IPValue’s licensing arrangement with Intel to license to third parties for revenue generation of older patents and as part of IP management helps in the maintenance of patent
portfolio.