Deer brand Cotton mull fabric, it is a very popular cloth in mideast, It is a white mull fabric.
You must have noticed such a phenomenon: in the zoo, the cute and auspicious sika deer is often loved by people. The same is true in the field of trademark design. Many companies use the "deer" graphic as the product trademark pattern, which is probably also easy to approach. Be attracted by its lively and cute characteristics! However, it is precisely because of its popularity that some trademark disputes have unknowingly brewed. Here is an example.

Shanghai T Company is an established professional foreign trade company established in 1957. It is mainly engaged in the import of high-end, multi-variety yarn, grey cloth, bleached cloth, printed cloth, acrylic, viscose fabric, woolen fabric, blended products and related products. Export trade. Due to the needs of business development, the company filed an application in Hong Kong on February 13, 1996 to register the "Deer brand" trademark on the 24 categories of goods in the international classification (see attached picture 1). Trademark application for protection of goods The range is all kinds of cloth.

During the review of the application, the Hong Kong Intellectual Property Department found that there were two similar trademarks with registration number 163/1939 (as shown in Figure 2) and 0424/1962 (as shown in Figure 3), so they did not agree to accept the "Deer Brand" of T Company. Trademark registration application in Hong Kong. Upon learning of this situation, Company T and its agent immediately proceeded to negotiate with the Intellectual Property Department through Hong Kong lawyers. It was emphasized that under the Hong Kong Trademark Law, the deer trademark of Company T can be used in good faith in Hong Kong for a long time. Obtained legal protection of trademarks; at the same time, the two cited products that are similar to registered trademarks are different from the products that T company applies for protection. The cited trademarks protect 25 categories of "thread yarn, singlet and vest" products. And T company applies The protection is 24 types of "cloth".

The Hong Kong Intellectual Property Department seriously considered this negotiation and required Company T to provide evidence of its long-term honest use of the deer brand trademark on various cloths in Hong Kong. Since it required to provide evidence of the use 5 years before the date of the application, Company T had to arrange immediately Personnel checked the relevant materials from the archives and business departments. After continuous hard work, finally from a large number of documents, I found a very valuable annual contract that can prove the sale of deer brand goods in Hong Kong, including supporting invoices, waybills and other evidence .Therefore, a chain of evidence can be formed to exert the effect of evidence. Because all the documents used show that the goods are only Mel veil and voile (English "MulⅤVoil"-that is, "bleached soft thin cloth, lightweight transparent gauze cloth", the author Note) The Hong Kong Intellectual Property Department turned to request T Company to restrict the products that apply for protection from the original types of cloth "to "textiles, textile fabrics (but not for clothing) bed sheets, table cloths or only bed sheets, table cloths," because of this restriction It is too strict, and T company uses its agents to fight for reasons, requesting that it be relaxed to "cotton, all kinds of meyer yarn, voile" products. The Hong Kong Intellectual Property Department is unwilling to make any more concessions. They pointed out that the revised products are better than The goods to be protected at the time of the application in 1996 have been significantly improved, but the product "cotton" is still involved. This is an important raw material for the goods protected by the registered trademark, which can easily cause consumers to misunderstand the source of the goods. Therefore, after fierce controversy, considering that the existing evidence of use shows that the 24 categories of "deer brand" products used in Hong Kong are all "mail and voile", T company finally agreed to apply for protection of the products , Limited to "cotton Maier yarn and cotton voile", at the same time, at the official request, T company also deleted the country-specific wording on the original trademark sample and gave up the exclusive right to use the word "brand" on the trademark After a series of amendments and controversies that lasted for 3 years, the deer trademark finally passed the substantive examination in Hong Kong, and an announcement was published in the 45th issue of the Hong Kong magazine in 1999 on November 12, 1999. The announcement period is 2 months. No objection was raised before January 12, 2000, and the deer brand trademark of T Company could be successfully registered in Hong Kong.