Recently, Mingdun Law Firm represented Kunlun Tongtai LLC. in the administrative dispute of trademark rejection review and the invalidation declaration dispute, successfully helping the client to invalidate the prior cited trademark registered in bad faith, and at the same time being making its core trademark approved for registration. The victory of these cases effectively safeguarded the client's brand and laid a solid foundation for the long-term development of the client's brand.
Shenzhen Kunlun Tongtai LLC. submitted an application of registration for its core trademark “” (transliterated as “Kunlun Tongtai”, same as its trade name) in class 35. Subsequently, the CNIPA rejected the trademark registration application on its main services on the grounds that the applied trademark was identical to the prior trademark No. 38297576 '' of Shanghai Mingnuo Electronic Technology Co., Ltd. Kunlun Tongtai LLC. filed an objection towards the cited mark, however, it was refused by the CNIPA. In order to protect its legitimate rights and interests, Shenzhen Kunlun Tongtai Company sought professional support from Mingdun.
Kunlun Tongtai mainly engaged in independent research and development, independent production and sales of human-computer interface products, providing users with integrated industrial automation solutions from hardware to software. After more than 20 years of development and continuous reform and innovation, Kunlun Tongtai has evolved from a complete upper computer configuration software to an independent product with supporting hardware platform and operating system. At present, the company not only realizes the diversification of products, but also enhances its own viability in the international context, which makes the 'Kunlun Tongtai' series products have stronger vitality in the competition with similar products. Its products sell well all over China, and the market share is gradually expanding.
'Kunlun Tongtai' is not only the trade name of Shenzhen Kunlun Tongtai LLC., but also its main trademark, which has been used continuously in commercial activities for many years. Its importance to the company is self-evident. Moreover, the registration of citation trademarks also seriously affects the normal business activities of the company.
After understanding the basic facts of the case, Mingdun believed that the client's rights should be protected, and then collected evidence in an all-round way with the client. The evidence we collect and fix mainly includes the invention of the trademark, prior use and popularity, and the bad faith of the prior trademark registrant. We have successively carried out in-depth and comprehensive excavation and fixation of the official website, trademark use place, product packaging, authorization letter, transaction documents, as well as the online publicity of Shanghai Mingnuo Electronic Technology Co., Ltd. Besides, we also collected the transaction documents and bills of Mingnuo and Kunlun Tongtai's Shanghai agent. All the evidence above were used to prove the fact that Shanghai Mingnuo preemptively registered well-known trademarks of others. After completing the evidence collection, Mingdun suggested that on one hand, the client could file an application for trademark invalidation against the registered 'Kunlun Tongtai' prior trademark in class 35 to remove the obstacles, and at the same time submit a new trademark registration application.
Shenzhen Kunlun Tongtai LLC. submitted an application of registration for trademark “” in class 35 to the CNIPA on June 4, 2021, and filed an invalidation against the malicious mark under No. 38297576 on August 17, 2021. Since the trademark invalidation procedure is much longer than the trademark registration application procedure, in order to maintain the validity of the applied trademark, the client then files a trademark review of refusal and litigation.
On August 16, 2022, Mingdun received a decision from the CNIPA, ruling that the cited mark has been invalidated in all the services. According to this decision, the court ruled that the CNIPA should make a new decision on the trademark application in class 35 by Kunlun Tongtai. So far, we have helped our client successfully combat trademark squatting, and at the same time will successfully register their own trademark in Class 35, safeguarding the legitimate rights and interests of the client.