{"id":3966,"date":"2017-06-30T10:07:00","date_gmt":"2017-06-30T09:07:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/klunker-ip.com\/risk-of-confusion-between-word-and-figurative-marks-beijing-high-court-smurf\/"},"modified":"2025-11-01T14:43:08","modified_gmt":"2025-11-01T13:43:08","slug":"risk-of-confusion-between-word-and-figurative-marks-beijing-high-court-smurf","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/klunker-ip.com\/en\/risk-of-confusion-between-word-and-figurative-marks-beijing-high-court-smurf\/","title":{"rendered":"Risk of Confusion between Word and Figurative Marks (Beijing High Court – SMURF)"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Assessing the Risk of Confusion between a Word Mark and a figurative mark is generally difficult. Is the image generally associated with a term and is this term confusable with the Word Mark? In the SMURF dispute, the Beijing High Court answered this question in favor of protecting the figurative mark. <\/strong><\/p>\n\n

The first comic figures of the “Schtroumpf’s” (Smurfs) were created around 60 years ago and have created their own little world over the years. Today, this miniature world is backed by a professional licensing business of Studio Peyo SA and various figures are protected by trademark law. <\/p>\n\n

In the case in dispute, the figurative mark of a Smurf and the Chinese Word Mark \u84dd\u7cbe\u7075 (pronounced “Lan jing ling”) faced each other. (So it was not about the phonetic similarity between the English word “Smurf” and the Chinese character). <\/p>\n\n

Studio Peyo SA was able to prove with great effort that the Smurfs had also achieved a certain degree of recognition in China before the disputed Word Mark “Lan jing ling” had been registered. There were films featuring the comic figures and in China the figures were known as “Lan jing ling”. <\/p>\n\n

The Beijing High Court confirmed the decisions of the lower courts. There is a Risk of Confusion for identical or similar goods because consumers would associate the younger Word Mark with the owner of the older figurative mark. <\/p>\n\n

Note: From a Western perspective, it may seem clear that Trademarks that are well-known in our country should also be protected in China. However, it is not so easy to prove that in individual cases the reputation is also sufficiently high in China itself. Studio Peyo SA has drawn the necessary conclusions and is now itself the owner of the Chinese Word Mark \u84dd\u7cbe\u7075 (“Lan jing ling”). This applies to a wide range of goods and services. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Assessing the Risk of Confusion between a Word Mark and a figurative mark is generally difficult. Is the image generally associated with a term and is this term confusable with the Word Mark? In the SMURF dispute, the Beijing High Court answered this question in favor of protecting the figurative mark. The first comic figures […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":5,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"site-sidebar-layout":"default","site-content-layout":"","ast-site-content-layout":"default","site-content-style":"default","site-sidebar-style":"default","ast-global-header-display":"","ast-banner-title-visibility":"","ast-main-header-display":"","ast-hfb-above-header-display":"","ast-hfb-below-header-display":"","ast-hfb-mobile-header-display":"","site-post-title":"","ast-breadcrumbs-content":"","ast-featured-img":"","footer-sml-layout":"","ast-disable-related-posts":"","theme-transparent-header-meta":"","adv-header-id-meta":"","stick-header-meta":"","header-above-stick-meta":"","header-main-stick-meta":"","header-below-stick-meta":"","astra-migrate-meta-layouts":"default","ast-page-background-enabled":"default","ast-page-background-meta":{"desktop":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"tablet":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"mobile":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""}},"ast-content-background-meta":{"desktop":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"tablet":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"mobile":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""}},"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-3966","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-nicht-kategorisiert"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/klunker-ip.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3966","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/klunker-ip.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/klunker-ip.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/klunker-ip.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/5"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/klunker-ip.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3966"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/klunker-ip.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3966\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/klunker-ip.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3966"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/klunker-ip.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3966"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/klunker-ip.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3966"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}