When Muji comes to mind,

what's your first thought?

a famous Japanese grocery brand?

A Cantonese song called Muji by Liang Yongqi?

or the muji combination of Guang Liang and Pin Guan?

by the way, we should also add a local "Muji" brand in China.

Nowadays, songs and groups are a thing of the past, leaving only two brands, namely "_ MUJI" in Japan and "Muji" in China. Now it seems to be "peaceful", but I don't know that in order to compete for this name, there is still a history of trademark disputes over 1 years.

In my impression, the indifferent Muji trademark looks like this:

However, online search can also find such a "Muji":

likui jy and Gui Li, which makes people confused. It seems that if you want to understand the ins and outs of Muji trademark disputes, you have to start from the beginning.

In p>25, MUJI, a brand under the Japanese Corporation's Good Products Program, entered China. When it wanted to register its trademark, it was found that the four-character trademark of Muji had been registered by others as early as 2, and the registrant was Beijing Muji Investment Co., Ltd. Immediately, the Good Product Project filed a series of lawsuits with the Beijing Intellectual Property Court on the grounds that Beijing Muji infringed its trademark rights and unfair competition.

it is not difficult to see that this is a typical dispute case caused by "overseas cybersquatting" of a well-known trademark. Perhaps for various reasons, the Good Product Plan did not do a good job in the distribution of intellectual property rights in China, which led to the "exploitation of loopholes" by people with a heart, and fell into the mire of trademark disputes, which had an impact on the overseas expansion of the brand.

in p>212, the Supreme People's Court ruled that the evidence provided by the good product plan of the company could only prove the publicity and popularity of its "_ Muji" trademark in Japan, China and Hongkong before April 6, 2, but could not prove the actual use of the trademark in Chinese mainland. Therefore, Beijing MUJI can use the trademark "aboveboard", and some consumers only find themselves "buying the wrong" goods after online shopping.

back to the case, the good product plan of the company claims that it is the trademark owner who has been approved to use the 25th class "_ MUJI" trademark, 24th class "MUJI" trademark and 2th class "Muji" trademark (hereinafter collectively referred to as the trademark involved). However, Beijing MUJI used a lot of "_ MUJI" and "MUJI" related logos in the process of commodity sales, publicity and promotion, which infringed upon the trademark exclusive right enjoyed by the MUJI project, constituted trademark infringement and belonged to unfair competition.

after trial, Beijing intellectual property court ruled that Beijing muji company immediately stopped the trademark exclusive right and unfair competition infringement against the good product project. The defendant Beijing Muji refused to accept the judgment and appealed to the Beijing Higher People's Court.

during the second trial, Beijing muji claimed that it enjoyed the trademark rights of several muji trademarks in the 24th category "towels, bed sheets, pillowcases" and "fabrics and printed cotton fabrics", which did not constitute infringement and unfair competition for the muji project.

The final judgment made by the Beijing Higher People's Court shows that: firstly, Beijing Muji Company uses the "Muji" trademark logo on its products, which belongs to the case of using the same or similar trademark with the registered trademark of the Good Product Program on similar products, which is easy to cause misunderstanding by consumers and has constituted an infringement on the exclusive right to use the trademark of the Good Product Program; Secondly, Beijing MUJI Company was established in 211, and Muji Muji, a subsidiary of the Good Products Program, had great brand awareness before its establishment. By preempting trademarks, Beijing Muji tried to open the market and gain benefits by relying on "famous brands", which constituted unfair competition.

To sum up, the Beijing Higher People's Court ruled that the appeal was dismissed and the original judgment was upheld.

There are a lot of China Muji shops on the market now.

Summary: Before opening up the market, enterprises must make a good layout plan of intellectual property rights and register their trademarks first, which should become a kind of knowledge. Only by registering a trademark and obtaining a legalized "identity" can we "stand firm" in a country or region and lay the foundation for future career planning.

Especially overseas brands want to enter the Chinese mainland market. Because China's trademark law adopts the principle of "trademark registration first", it is very necessary to register trademarks in time, which can effectively avoid many potential disputes and protect the intangible assets of enterprises. trade mark registration