Adidas Trademark Infringement Case Concluded And Little Golden Egg Trade Compensated RMB 1.2 Million

Recently, Zhou Hong, the president of the People's Court of Ouhai District, Wenzhou City, Zhejiang Province, served as the presiding judge, holding a public hearing and delivering a verdict Adidas Ltd. v. Wenzhou Little golden egg Trade Co., Ltd. trademark infringement case. It is reported that Adidas sued for compensation of up to 3 million yuan, which is the first trademark dispute in China in which the company requested the application of the legal upper limit of compensation.

On September 15, 2015, Adidas agents placed an order for three pairs of shoes in an online store of Tmall called "Little Golden Egg Flagship Store", and believed that they infringed on Adidas' ("three slash trademark") ("Three Stripes Trademark"), ("Trifolium Trademark") and other registered trademark exclusive rights, filed a lawsuit to Ouhai Court on May 16 this year, asking the other party to stop producing and selling the products involved in the case, and compensate the economic loss of 3 million yuan.

Adidas sued that Xiaojindan Company was the actual operator of Tmall's "Xiaojindan Flagship Store", and its production and sales violated Adidas trademark Goods with exclusive right. Moreover, according to the transaction records, the sales volume of shoes involved in the case is extremely large. Since the first half of 2015, more than 150000 pairs of infringing products have been sold, with the sales amount exceeding 10 million yuan.

After Adidas sued, it applied to the court for property preservation and evidence preservation. Ouhai Court immediately froze the account deposit of Xiaojindan Company of 1.5 million yuan and the balance of Alipay of 1.5 million yuan, went to the business premises of Xiaojindan Company for evidence preservation, and seized the infringing products involved in the lawsuit.

In the court, Little Golden Egg Company argued that the product and other logos it sold were different from and similar to those of Adidas, and that searching the trademark of Adidas on the Internet would not reveal information about its products, which would not lead to consumers' misunderstanding, so it did not infringe the exclusive right of Adidas to use trademarks. He also said that the sales volume and amount were not consistent with the content displayed on the website because of the situation of order swiping and return.

After hearing the case, the court held that the trademark registered by Adidas in the China Trademark Office was protected by Chinese law, and Xiaojindan Company used a logo similar to the Adidas registered trademark on the shoes involved in the case, which infringed the trademark rights of Adidas. Moreover, the business model of Little Golden Egg Company is online sales. The consumers involved exceed the limits of geographical space, and the infringement lasts for a long time. The sales volume of the accused infringing goods is up to 100000 pairs.

Finally, Ouhai Court ruled that Wenzhou Xiaojindan Trading Co., Ltd. immediately stopped the infringement and compensated Adidas Co., Ltd. for the economic loss of 1.2 million yuan.