The Importance Of Trademark: Is It Possible For Jordan Sports To "Regenerate" In The 7 Years Of Dispute?

In those days, Jordan's trademark case was bubbling with excitement. The two sides had been lawsuits for several years. Recently, it was learned that Jordan's sport was about to land A shares. Did the former trademark disturbance have subsided? How could Jordan get "reborn"?

Jordan VS Jordan Sports

Jordan sports Limited by Share Ltd (hereinafter referred to as Jordan sports), founded in 2000, is mainly engaged in the design, R & D, production and sale of sports shoes, sportswear and sports accessories. It is the top 100 enterprises in Fujian and the top thirty enterprises in Fujian. Jordan's sports name is equipped with a series of trademarks such as "Jordan", "QIAODAN" and "Jordan sports".

Awkwardly, there is also an American basketball legend Michael Jordan. Jordan sports was founded in 2000. In the same year, Michael Jordan has won 6 NBA championship rings, and is one of the most influential players in basketball and sports circles. So Jordan sports naming behavior and related trademark registration, so that consumers do not know the situation will be linked to the two, such a practice is very free riding suspicion.

I wonder if it is not the name of "Jordan". The sales performance of Jordan sports has been climbing steadily. Even in 2010, the annual revenue surged to 2 billion 927 million yuan, and its sales ranked sixth in the local sports brand, after Lining, Anta, XTEP, 31st degree and PEAK. But in the process, Michael Jordan did not raise any objection. It was not until 2012 when Jordan sports program landed at the Shanghai stock exchange that Michael Jordan took the lead in taking Jordan sports to court on the grounds of infringement of trademark rights and name rights.

So he began the lawsuit repeatedly.

In 2012, Michael Jordan applied for the cancellation of 78 related registered trademarks of Jordan sports, but the business jury decided to maintain a series of trademark registration of Jordan sports.

In 2015, the first intermediate court of Beijing rejected Michael Jordan's claim in the first instance and second instance.

In 2016, the Supreme People's court pronounced that 78 trademarks of Jordan's sports registration, including 3 trademarks of "Jordan", were found to be contrary to the provisions of the trademark law and be revoked. However, these illegal trademarks are defensive trademarks of other commodities around. On the contrary, Jordan sports's 4 most important trademarks used in main business have been maintained.

Jordan sports said afterwards that the trademark currently used by the company was basically not affected. Even so, Jordan sports also paid a huge price for this matter. On the one hand, because of the major litigation involved, the Jordan sports IPO process has been stranded and missed many opportunities. On the other hand, consumers are inclined to support Michael Jordan and think Jordan sports is a Shanzhai, thereby destroying the brand image portrayed by Jordan sports.

Jordan sports how to "reborn"?

However, under such a heavy blow, why can Jordan sports again appear in IPO?

Jordan sports wants to regain market recognition, brand remolding is an inevitable choice. For this reason, the company has launched an action.

On the one hand, Jordan sports made adjustments to trademarks.

Some shop images have reduced the word "Jordan sports", and some have added new words such as "QDSPORTS" or "BREYOUND YOURSELF". Brand name "basketball player" is no longer prominent. Instead, the appearance labels of some garments are changed to "BUN+", "TEAM", "SHOT" and "YOUTH". Only the trademark at the beginning of the neckline or sleeve is marked with disputed trademark.

On the other hand, Jordan sports sponsors sports competitions frequently, and uses the competition platform to convey the brand image.

Jordan sports sponsored the World University Winter Games, the International Collegiate Athletic Association (FISU) and the thirteenth Tianjin National Games. At the same time, it was the equipment sponsor of the Chinese and Russian delegations at the 25-30 World University Summer Games.

However, in the course of these actions, the "basketball playing" pattern and the word "QIAODAN" are still everywhere. Jordan sports does not seem to have completely changed the meaning of the trademark.

In addition, since 1990s, other brands of Jinjiang shoe factories have been renamed, for example, "Sanxing" has changed to "XTEP", "Buick" has been renamed "360 degrees", "seeking quality" has become "Anta" and so on, and these enterprises have completed IPO before 2010, and now they are developing well.

As the same batch of Jordan sports, it could have become the "A share sports brand first stock", but because of the trademark case missed the opportunity, now sweeping around again, do not know whether this success?