The Brazilian Supreme Court has issued a favorable opinion to Apple in a long-running dispute over the exclusive use of the iPhone brand in the country, reports MacRumors.
In 2013 Apple lost the rights to its iPhone trademark in Brazil , but challenged the ruling by Brazil’s copyright regulator to prevent local firm Gradiente Eletronica SA from using the “iphone” brand name.
The regulator, Inpi, that the rights to the trademark belong to Gradiente, prompting California-based Apple to request that the decision be reviewed in Latin America’s largest market. Consumer electronics maker Gradiente had filed its request to use the “iphone” brand in 2000, seven years before Apple launched its smartphone, but received approval to use the trademark only in 2008.
In August 2020 the decision of the Federal Regional Court of the 2nd Region (Rio de Janeiro) which, despite attesting the good faith of IGB and rejecting Apple’s thesis that the term “iPhone” was merely descriptive of the product (as a synonym for “smartphone”) and therefore unregistrable, ruled in favor of the American company because it explored the brand most efficiently.
And last Friday Brazilian Prosecutor General Augusto Aras gave his assent to Apple’s position. As noted by MacRumors, he said that even though IGB Electronica applied to register the iPhone trademark several years before Apple’s smartphone was launched, the “iPhone” brand has since become a globally recognized name, and therefore plays an important role in the world electronics market.
