With internet courts in first Hangzhou, then Beijing and Guangzhou, the trend is set also for the specialized IP courts in China to deal remotely with the review application, evidence, cross-examination, and verdict. The objective of this remote trial system is to reduce the litigation burden of the parties and improve the efficiency of the trademark review process.
On 17 December 2018, the Beijing Intellectual Property Court dealt remotely with the hearing on the TRAB’s refusal of the registration of the mark of the London-based fashion house “JW ANDERSON”: plaintiffs and defendants could conduct the process remotely via the internet.
In addition to audio-visual interactivity, the court applied artificial intelligence technology such as face recognition and intelligent voice transfer (for example speech to text, speaker identification).
Source: online version of the People’s Daily, see here.
So, what happened to the JW ANDERSON case?
The court held that the goods between the cited mark and applicant mark are similar; clothing and wedding products respectively, and the marks have the same composition and share a similar logo. If the two trademarks coexist in the same market (the applicant mark was used on Taobao and Jing Dong (JD.com) websites), this leads to a likelihood of confusion as to the source of the goods.
The evidence submitted by the applicant is not sufficient to prove that the applied trademark has obtained distinctive features that can be distinguished from the cited trademark by its use. Therefore, the application for registration of the trademark was rejected.
See here.
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