Cisco iPhone claim looking shaky
p2pnet.net News:- In the continuing iPhone controvery in which Cisco, apparently the legal owner of the trademark, accuses Apple, apparently not the legal owner, of launching Steve Jobs’ latest money-spinner without first getting permission to use the name, in Canada, Comwave Telecom Inc definitely got there first.
“The Toronto-based company has been marketing a voice-over-Internet services under the registered trademark IPhone since 2004 and even has a wireless device called IPhone Mobile,” says Canada East.
There’s no confirmed reports that, “Apple will launch IPhone in Canada,” Comwave president and ceo Yuval Barzakay is quoted as saying and anyway, there’s no reason for his company to change its plans, “just because the two big U.S. technology companies happen to want to use IPhone for their products as well”.
“There are tens of thousands of Canadians across Canada using the IPhone,” the story has him saying. “It’s an extremely successful product for us. And our plans are to forge ahead, unless we get legal opinion to do otherwise.”
The Canadian iPhone is actually a, “bundle of hardware and services, sold as an alternative to traditional phone service,” says Canada East. “It’s available in 500 communities across Canada.”
Meanwhile, it now transpires Jobs may be in the clear after all because, “According to trademark law experts, Cisco may not be the owner of the iPhone name,” says iLounge.
“If Cisco didn`t launch a product using the iPhone name, their trademark registration would be canceled and they would have no bargaining chips with Apple,” it has attorney Jay Behmke saying. “So in order to keep the trademark active, they had to file the Declaration of Use, and start selling a product under that trademark.
“It is possible that the Declaration of Use is defective, as there was no continuous use, and the sample that Cisco submitted was for a product not released until 7 months later. The fact that the Declaration of Use was submitted only days before the deadline expires gives me the impression that they were scrambling to get a product to market, and had to file the Declaration before the product was ready.”
Things aren’t looking too good for Cisco in Europe either.
“Trade mark specialist Lee Curtis of Pinsent Masons, the law firm behind OUT-LAW.COM, has found a legal loophole, though, which could strip Cisco of its European rights,” says Out-Law.com. “He told technology law podcast OUT-LAW Radio that in Europe a person can lodge a revocation application against a trade mark registration if the trade mark has not been used for the past five years.
“Just such a revocation was lodged by a German law firm, CMS, on exactly the same day, 18th December 2006, on which Cisco launched the iPhone.
“OUT-LAW can find no use in Europe of the iPhone trade mark in the five years preceding that revocation application, which means Cisco’s ownership of the trade mark is under threat in Europe. Though there are references in US media to Linksys products dating from 2005 using the iPhone name, this is unlikely to count as use in Europe unless there were sales into the EU or Linksys, a subsidiary of Cisco, undertook advertising and promotional activity in the EU.
“If CMS filed its revocation application before Cisco launched its product, meaning earlier that day, then Cisco will lose the trade mark rights.”
Also See:
not the legal owner – Apple’s iPhone hijack: more, January 12, 2007
Canada East – VoIP provider Comwave beats Apple, Cisco to IPhone trademark in Canada, January 12, 2007
iLounge – Cisco lost rights to iPhone trademark last year?, January 12, 2007
Out-Law.com – Cisco on brink of losing iPhone name in Europe, January 12, 2007
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