The first-ever lawsuit involving a foreign auto manufacturer in
China since the country's entry to the World Trade Organization
started yesterday in the Beijing No .2 Intermediate People's Court,
with Japanese Toyota suing Chinese car manufacturer Geely for
trademark infringement and illicit competition.
No verdict was reached at the first hearing, which lasted for
nearly one day.
Toyota has asked for 14 million yuan (US$1.7 million) in
compensation.
"The logo of Geely Group's Merry (trademark of a model of
economically affordable car produced by the company) is very
similar to the Toyota logo, constituting infringement of our
client's well-known trademark," Shi Yusheng, the lawyer
representing the plaintiff Toyota said in court.
As proof, Shi listed a report by the Beijing-based Shaohai
Market Investigation Company which says that "most consumers
consider that vehicles with the Merry logo have connections with
Toyota."
Among the 317 consumers surveyed, nearly 67 percent thought that
vehicles with the Merry logo were Toyota products, while only 6.9
percent identified such vehicles as Merrys produced by the
Zhejiang-based Geely Group, according to Shi.
The accused Geely Group argued that, "the report lacked factual
evidence."
"The investigation cannot be considered authentic as the
questions were weighted to suggest to the people surveyed the
answer the investigators wanted," said Wang Zhong, the lawyer
representing Geely, who also pointed out that the investigation by
the Shaohai Company had not been notarized.
The accused further listed another investigation on the same
issue to support their stand.
A research report by the famous polling company Horizon Research
showed that 44.6 percent of the surveyed people recognized Merry
cars when shown pictures of them, and only 7.2 percent
misidentified them as Toyotas or Xialis, another domestic brand.
The remaining 48.2 percent said they did not know the car at
all.
Toyota registered its logo in 1990 and the registration is
effective until 2010, according to sources with the Japanese
company.
Geely registered its joint Merry trademark with Chinese
character and logo with the State Trademark Administration in 1996,
but registration of the independent logo has not been authorized
since Geely applied in 2001. Toyota objects to Geely's use of the
logo.
(China Daily August 7, 2003)