Yesterday 45 Apple iPad’s were pulled out of selected Chinese reseller location in Shijiazhuang China as part of the iPad trademark dispute in China over. As part of the dispute Proview, who owns the iPad trademark in China, is seeking between $38 million and $1.6 billion dollars in compensation as well as a sales ban of the popular tablet.
However, Chinese customs authorities have told Proview that any ban on the import or export of the tablet would be difficult to impose due to the sheer size of the market.
“The customs have told us that it will be difficult to implement a ban because many Chinese consumers love Apple products. The sheer size of the market is very big,” Yang Long-san, chairman of Proview Technology (Shenzhen), told Reuters. “We have applied to some local customs for the ban and they’ll report to the headquarters in Beijing,”
It seems that Proviews best course of action maybe to seek an out of court settlement with Apple.
If this is news to you an you’re wondering how this all came about back in 2006, Apple used a UK company called IP Application Development to quietly buy the global rights to use the iPad trademark from Proview Electronics. However, supposedly this deal did not somehow include the rights to use the iPad name in China. Reportedly, Proview’s chairman, Yang Rongshan, didn’t realize there was a connection between IP Application Development and Apple. But once Rongshan realized the connection, that’s when matters escalated.
Proview threatened a lawsuit against Apple back in 2010, but didn’t actually follow through until 2011. Apple countersued, but lost their case.
Naturally, an appeal has been made, but the Xicheng district court administration has said that the case is still under investigation. Additional lawsuits have been filed in Shenzhen and Huizhou to stop the marketing and sales of the iPad in China. Damages totaling between $38 million and $1.6 billion dollars are sought by Proview Technology.
Via Reuters
