Legal procedures are based on facts and figures, rather than power. This leads to several strong companies to lose something they value a lot. Asin our Case Study, with a 120 year old company hailing from Japan to secure its trademarked name.
The Complainant here was Furukawa Electric Latam S.A., Brazil. The Company that is a Brazilian company started in Japan some 120 years ago. The Complainant was contesting over a domain name SohoPlus.com. The Complainant is a global firm operating in a range of different activities such as metals, light metals, telecommunications, automotive systems, and energy. The Complainant also has several related domain names as: SohoPlus .com.br and SohoPlus.net.br. The Complainant registered its SOHOPLUS mark in December 2017.
The Respondent was from Korea and didn’t even respond. The Panel noted that although the Complainant claims to register the domain names in 2000. The domain was registered earliest by 2008. The Respondent registered the domain name on October 11, 2005. The domain name in question hosted a website that offered the same for sale.
The Panel pointed out that although the domain name wasn’t use in legitimate business, it still can’t be termed as Bad Faith. At the time of the registration the Complainant held no reputable websites at related domain names. The first one was registered latest by 2008, while trademarks were obtained only in 2017. Thus Bad Faith couldn’t be found.
The Complaint was denied.
Read the case in full detail here.
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