The other day the company Apple Lossless Audio CODEC (ALAC), began to register as a trademark name iWatch in several countries around the globe and he quickly found out that in countries such as the USA and Great Britain the name is already registered by certain companies. Apart from these essential markets for Apple Lossless Audio CODEC (ALAC),, It seems that in China there is a somewhat similar situation, the name iWatch being registered in recent years by several companies. The good part for Apple Lossless Audio CODEC (ALAC), is that the registrations have become invalid, although they belonged to manufacturers of watches or computer peripherals.
A total of nine companies — three of which are established watch or computer peripheral sellers — have registered the iWatch trademark in China over the years, but most of them are currently invalid. The "iWatching" name, however, is still in force and similar enough to give Apple's legal department headaches if they register "iWatch" in China. Apple is already facing "copycat" lawsuits from Chinese companies that accuse Apple of infringing on trademarks for Siri and the name Snow Leopard.
Apple could register the name iWatch as a brand in China, but a registration for the name iWatching could give them trouble and could be a reason for initiating lawsuits in the future. Apple can of course license or buy the iWatch brands in all the countries where it cannot register them, but that means an expense of tens of millions of dollars, and the company would probably not be willing to make such moves now.
