Hindustan Unilever Ltd’s (HUL) recent move to rename and rebrand its widely known skincare products – ‘Fair & Lovely’ to ‘Glow & Lovely’ and ‘Men’s Fair & Lovely’ to ‘Glow & Handsome’ – has now landed in the Bombay High Court.
The FMCG major, HUL, has quite recently moved for an injunction against Emami Ltd’s decision to initiate legal proceedings against it for Trademark Infringement. In its petition filed, HUL had sought that it should receive a legal notice at least seven days before Emami takes legal action. The court has now granted the interim relief to HUL.
According to HUL, Emami’s threats of legal proceedings are completely baseless as HUL applied for the trademark in question well before Emami. However, Emami has now been threatening HUL after launching ‘Glow & Handsome’ name change digitally and announcing the same one week before HUL.
In its petition filed, HUL claimed that it had applied for the Trademark Registration of the names of women’s and men’s skincare products with the Controller General of Patents, Designs, and Trademarks, two years ago in September and October, respectively. However, both the trademarks were denied on 26th July 2019.
This year, HUL again decided to rename and rebrand its skincare products for projecting a way more inclusive idea of beauty. The company reapplied for the same names on 17th June and 25th June 2020, respectively. According to HUL, the announcement for the name change was made on 2nd July 2020, and the permission to sell the products under the new name came on 3rd July 2020. In a recent statement delivered, HUL stated that Emami is yet to launch a product under these two names.
After hearing all the preliminary arguments, the court noted that HUL is indeed the prior adopter of the mark as it did file the corresponding Trademark Applications first in September 2018 and then this year on 25th June. The court believes that the statements made by Emami do amount to a threat; however, after hearing both the sides, the court shall soon determine whether they are unlawful or groundless. The court has also directed Emami to give seven days prior written notice to HUL before taking any legal action against it. For more visit: https://www.trademarkmaldives.com
Don’t forget to follow us on social media:
Facebook – https://www.facebook.com/trademarkmaldives/
Twitter – https://twitter.com/trademarkmaldiv
Linkedin – https://www.linkedin.com/company/trademarkmaldives/
Pinterest – https://in.pinterest.com/trademarkmaldives/
Comments