Trademarks and Fashion : A First Survey in Different Parts of the World.

Book

viii, 278 pages ; 22 cm

9788828818045 Print

K 311 SAP.T

Trademarks are strategical tools for ensuring a competitive advantage for businesses active in the fashion field. Fashion industry is of a growing importance in different countries around the world, such as US, Japan, South Corea, Hong Kong, China, India and the EU. This is why this collective work includes some chapters on the said trademark systems. Overall, this collection provides information and inspirational elements or models from different legal frameworks, and thus encourage to elaborate so much needed transnational perspectives in the fashion trademarks field. A first chapter of the work is devoted to the European area, a second one to the Asiatic zone and a third one to the US territory. As to the first chapter on the Eurozone, it starts with two papers on trademarks in the fashion field. More precisely, the first paper is related to absolute grounds of refusal and, through examples, it explains how they impact the fashion field. The second paper focuses on conflicts between signs and explores how both substantial and procedural rules in trademark law affect the fashion market; it studies how some market operators use the competitive advantage given by renowned trademarks. The chapter continues with some EU and national case law comments. Case law comments enable the reader to have a more exhaustive picture of legal sources and a better understanding of regional and national policies, as well as of the state of art in this field. First, landmark decisions of the European Court of Justice on trademarks in the fashion field are commented extensively. Then, comments concern case law in some of the EU member states: these countries are France, Italy, Spain and UK. The fact of having case comments brings along an added value: it provides information as to the brands-related cases brought to courts in different countries (and solved in front of them) and may give some tips as to business strategies for defending their trademarks from infringement or dilution. The second chapter is split into four different paragraphs, each devoted to the analysis of fashion trademarks in Asian countries of economic relevance. A first paragraph focuses on the Japanese state of art and explains the reader how to distinguish trademarks from design protection. Secondly, different trademarks-related aspects are studied through a commentary of South Korean case law, which gives the reader a very informative (and first?) contact with the reality in that society. The third paragraph is devoted to India and it is a picture of the impact of some of the very renowned but not nationally-based brands on this huge emerging market. Fourth, a paper contains remarks and information on the main sources in China and Hong Kong. A translation of some Chinese case law and a short collection of Hong Kong cases is also added with very concise remarks, in order to make the paragraph more informative. The third chapter is devoted to the US legal system, and more precisely it focuses on copyright and trademarks aspects, and discusses how trademarks are considered the ¿king¿ protection in this area.

New York, NY : Giuffrè , 2020.

English