Apple tried to sue a Chinese company that claims to have registered the iPad name for tablets more than a decade ago. Apple claims that that registration cannot be valid, especially since now the American company has registered the name as a trademark in several countries. A Chinese court rejected the claims of those from Apple and decided that the registration of the Proview company is legal and for Apple things are not good at all considering that the iPad tablet is available for purchase in China. This is the third defeat suffered by Apple in just two weeks and I'm starting to think that the luck of those from Cupertino is starting to run out.
A court in southern China has rejected a lawsuit by Apple Inc, accusing a Chinese technology company of infringing its iPad trademark, a newspaper reported on Tuesday, the latest move in a protracted tug-of-war over the name. The Intermediate People's Court in the southern boomtown of Shenzhen rejected Apple's lawsuit against Proview Technology (Shenzhen). Proview, it said, legally registered the iPad trademark as long ago as 2000 for products in a number of countries including China, the Southern Metropolis Daily newspaper reported, citing court documents.
Unfortunately for Apple it is not just a matter of luck because the Chinese company Proview demanded that Apple pay 1.5 billion dollars claiming that Apple would have infringed the title of the registered trademark of the iPad when it put the tablet on sale in China. If a court decides that the Proview company registered the iPad trademark more than a decade ago, then Apple might have to reach an agreement with it, otherwise it risks being denied the right to sell the tablet in China.
