DECISIONS
Application (and where applicable, earlier mark)
Ref no.
TRADE MARKS
Comment understood the letters “TSA” to be an abbreviation for “Transportation Security Administration”. Accordingly, Travel Sentry had failed to demonstrate that at the relevant date the mark was descriptive, devoid of distinctive character, or deceptive. The GC dismissed the appeal in its entirety.
GC T-648/16 Şölen Çikolata Gıda Sanayi ve Ticaret AŞ v EUIPO; Elka Zaharieva 17 April 2018 Reg 207/2009 Reported by: Rebekah Sellars
– yoghurt; milk beverages, milk predominating; milk products (29) – candy; yoghurt (frozen-) confectionery ices; confectionery made of sugar; powders for ice cream; candy; ices and ice creams (30) – almonds (milk of-) beverage; nonalcoholic beverages; milk (peanut-) non-alcoholic beverage (32)
– cocoa, cakes, chocolates, chocolate creams, cakes with cocoa milk and chocolate cream (30) (International registration designating various EU Member States)
38 CIPA JOURNAL
3-pp32-41-TM_10.indd 38
MAY 2018
The GC upheld the BoA’s decision that there was no likelihood of confusion between the marks under article 8(1)(b). The BoA was correct to find that the marks were visually dissimilar. The image of the rabbit constituted a particularly striking feature of the mark applied for, dominating its visual representation, with no counterpart in the earlier mark. Furthermore, the word elements ‘bobo’ of the mark applied for and ‘ozmo’ of the earlier mark had greater visual impact than the other word element ‘cornet’ and would be perceived by the relevant public as visually different. The BoA was correct to find that a phonetic similarity was below average. The words ‘bobo’ and ‘ozmo’ would have greater phonetic impact than the word ‘cornet’ and would be pronounced differently in all the relevant languages due to their different respective first syllables. The marks were conceptually dissimilar. The mere fact that the verbal element ‘cornet’ was present in both marks did not introduce even a low degree of conceptual similarity, in view of its descriptive, non-distinctive nature and having regard to the fact that there was an absence of any concept conveyed by the words ‘bobo’ and ‘ozmo’. In light of the dominant character of the rabbit in the mark applied for and the visual and phonetic differences, the BoA was correct to find no likelihood of confusion between the marks.
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03/05/2018 20:51:47