Starbucks loses lawsuit to ban Chinese imitator
Staff Reporter
2012-08-31
12:50 (GMT+8)
A Starbucks outlet in Shanghai. (Photo/Xinhua)
Starbucks has failed to prevent a Chinese company from registering a trademark similar to the coffee chain's Chinese name, reports the Chinese-language Beijing News.
A local Beijing court affirmed the decision of the China Trademark Board, which refused the US coffee chain's attempts to revoke the trademark of a Chinese entrepreneur who registered the trademark "Sha Ba Ke" for mineral water products back in 2003.
Starbucks, which entered the Chinese market in 1998, claims that the trademark tries to imitate or copy the company's Chinese name "Xing Ba Ke." The name of the local brand sounds similar and even contains two of the same Chinese characters. Attempts to have the Sha Ba Ke trademark revoked were initially denied by the China Trademark Board, which cited a lack of evidence demonstrating that Starbucks was sufficiently famous in China at the time the businessman registered the trademark.
The board also ruled that despite containing two identical characters, the pronunciation and "look" of Sha Ba Ke was sufficiently different to Starbucks to prevent consumers from becoming confused into believing that the two brands were identical or related.
Starbucks opened its first store in Seattle in 1971. The global coffee giant currently has more than a hundred franchises in China.
