A well-known trademark is just like a magnet, in that the goodwill associated with it attracts a lot of people who want to exploit it for their own interests. Of course, this use is done on bad faith as their main purpose is to mislead consumers and create the wrong perception.
This was precisely what Vincent Siswanto did. Mr. Siswanto is a local businessman from Kembangan, West Jakarta, whose core business is electronic goods. It appears that the name High Tech Computer (HTC), owned by HTC Corporation, a well-known manufacturer of telecommunication goods from Taiwan, proved to be too much of a draw for him, and led him to begin using the HTC trademark on his products. Not only was he using the HTC trademark but he also wanted to legally own it. Thus he filed a trademark application for HTC in class 09 under his name.
Mr. Siswanto was quite determined to possess the HTC trademark. He filed two trademark applications for HTC under class 09. The first application covered optical goods, photograph goods, cables, flash disks, USB VCD Player, DVD player, and video game player while the second application covered hand phones, telephones, and smart phones. The two applications were registered under his name.
Both of Mr. Siswanto’s trademark registrations became a barrier to HTC Corporation’s own application of the HTC trademark. It was quite clear that Mr. Siswanto had filed his two trademark applications on bad faith as the goods indicated in his applications are the same kinds of goods that are produced by HTC Corporation.
As expected, HTC Corporation initiated a lawsuit against Mr. Siswanto at the Commercial Court of Jakarta. Through their attorney, HTC Corporation filed two lawsuits against Mr. Siswanto, the first was for the deletion of his registered HTC trademark in class 09 based on non-use of the trademark within three years. In this case, during the trial, Mr. Siswanto could not provide any evidence that he was using his HTC trademark for the production and distribution of phones, hand phones, and smart phones in Indonesia. The judges agreed with HTC Corporation’s claim.
The second lawsuit was to cancel the registration of the HTC trademark in the name of Vincent Siswanto under class 09 for optical goods, photograph goods, cables, flash disks, USB VCD Player, DVD player, and video game player. HTC Corporation argued that their HTC trademark is well-known and has been filed and/or registered in at least 108 countries around the world, and Mr. Siswanto had intended to use the popularity of the HTC trademark for his personal gain. In his plea, Mr. Siswanto accused the Trademark office for being inconsistent in protecting applicants’ rights based on the first to file system, and also accused HTC Corporation of monopolizing the business.
The judge, in his decision, concurred with HTC Corporation’s claims, affirming that the HTC trademark owned by HTC Corporation was indeed well-known. HTC Corporation has been recognized as a multinational company since 1997, as the manufacture of cell-phone components from Nokia, BlackBerry, Apple and Motorola.
Vincent Siswanto, still adamant to win the case, appealed against the Commercial Court’s decision to the Supreme Court. However, the Supreme Court dismissed the appeal on the basis that the matter had already been heard in the lower court and there is no new material for the Supreme Court to assess. The Supreme Court cited the well-known ne bis in idem policy, where no legal action can be instituted twice for the same cause of action, and held that the decision delivered by the Commercial Court was valid.
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