Recently, Guangdong Higher People’s Court (hereinafter the Court) made the final judgment in favor of Mr. Zhou in the trademark dispute cases against New Balance Trading (China) Co. Ltd. (hereinafter New Balance China). The court ruled that Mr. Zhou’s trademark was infringed and New Balance China was ordered to pay a compensation of 5,000,000 RMB.
In first instance, Guangzhou Intermediate People’s Court found that the trademark “百伦”, first applied for registration in 1996, was transferred to Mr. Zhou in 2004. In June 2004, Mr. Zhou applied for trademark registration of “新百伦” covering the goods of shoes, boots and sports shirts in class 25. New Balance China was founded in 2006, mainly responsible for the marketing of New Balance sports shoes in China. Chinese words “新百伦”were used for advertising and marketing.
The Court affirmed the facts examined by the lower court, and held that New Balance China was established on December 27, 2006, which was later than the application date of Mr. Zhou’s trademark.
In terms of the amount of compensation, the Court held that consumers tend to think more of the high reputation and good quality related to marks of “N” “NB” “NEW BALANCE”. Therefore, the profit of New Balance China was not all from infringement of Mr. Zhou’s marks of “百伦” “新百伦”. Therefore, the Court made the decision to order New Balance China to cease the infringement and make a compensation of 5,000,000 RMB.
