Recently, the British luxury car maker Land Rover brought a suit against the decision of the Trademark Review and Adjudication Board (TRAB) under the State Administration for Industry and Commerce (SAIC) before the Beijing Municipal No.1 Intermediate People’s Court over a trademark dispute which was in favor of Geely Group (Hereinafter refers to as Geely), a Chinese auto manufacturer.
Geely applied for registration of “Luhu” (陆虎) (literally “land tiger” in Chinese) trademark covering goods of automobile and motorcycle in 1999, and the mark was approved for registration in 2001.
In 2004, Land Rover filed a request before the TRAB to cancel “Luhu” (陆虎) trademark registered by Geely. The TRAB in 2010 made a decision which maintained the registration of “Luhu” (陆虎) trademark. Thereinafter, Land Rover brought the case to the court asking for review of the TRAB’s decision.
Land Rover argued that being in the automobile industry, Geely should have known Land Rover and its uses of Luhu (陆虎) (the “land tiger” ) in China. Besides, Land Rover as a world famous company has over 60 years of automotive history and has been in China using Luhu (陆虎) trademark for long. Geely’s trademark registration was an intentional copy or imitation of its mark. Land Rover also showed to the court that Geely has intentionally registered several trademarks identical or similar to world-famous auto brands, such as F1, BMW, Geely Jiebao(吉利·捷豹) (same as Jaguar’s translation in Chinese), Geely Hanma(吉利·汉马) (sounds like Hummer’s Chinese name), and Geely Meizhoubao(吉利·美洲豹) (another Chinese version of Jaguar). Land Rover argued that Geely’s behavior of copying or imitating well-known auto brands suggested its malicious intention.
Before the court, Land Rover provided more than 40 media reports to prove their use of “Luhu” (陆虎) (also the “land tiger” one) for brand communication and media promotion in China since 1996. Geely also argued that Land Rover has been using different Chinese transliterations such as 兰德罗孚，路华. And 陆虎(Chinese pinyin Luhu) is only one of them.
No ruling is made yet.
