A group of automobile manufacturers were recently fined a total sum of Rs. 25.45 billion for the practices that they adopted in the sale of their spare parts (read the 215 page order of the Commission here). The worst affected in the group was Tata Motors with a penalty of about Rs. 13.4 billion with Maruti Suzuki coming in next with a penalty of Rs. 4 billion. The grievance of the informant was that the spare parts for the cars…
As promised in my previous post, today’s post looks at the three defenses of functionality, novelty and two design registrations by the Plaintiff with minor modifications on the same day, which were urged by the Defendant in the matter of Whirlpool of India Ltd. v. Videocon Industries Ltd. It will also look at whether the issue of passing off in this case was rightly decided by the Court. FUNCTIONALITY The first defense urged by the Defendant was that of functionality…
(This is a two part post on the Bombay HC decision. This post looks at the issues of maintainability of a suit for infringement between two registered proprietors and whether there was an infringement in this case. The second post looks at the defenses of functionality, novelty and the fact that the plaintiff had obtained two registration with minor variations on the same day. It also considers the issue of passing off) At the end of May, the Bombay High…
The following post discusses a patent and design infringement case (M.C. Jayasingh Vs. Mishra Dhatu Nigam Limited (MIDHANI) rep. by its Managing Director, Apollo Hospitals) decided by the Madras High Court in January 2014. The court upheld the validity of the patent and design but also found no infringement by the defendants. [*long post] Facts The plaintiff along with Professor Mayilvahanan Natarajan (co-patentee) invented various prosthetics for limb salvage surgery. Made of titanium alloy or medical grade stainless steel, ‘Custom…
Background The Delhi HC, in M/S. Jagdamba Impex (“Appellant” who is the original defendant) v. M/S. Tristar Products Pvt. Ltd (“Respondent” who is the original plaintiff) (FAO No. 128/2014 & CM Nos. 7778-79/2014 & FAO No. 129/2014 & CM Nos. 7782-83/2014), examined the applicability of Section 15(2) of Copyright Act, 1957. The first appeal was filed under Order 43 Rule 1(r) CPC impugning the order of the trial court dated 19.2.2014 which had earlier allowed the application of the Respondent…
The inimitable IPKat has been very kind to SpicyIP in a recent post, where they noted: “…this Kat notes with pleasure that one of INTA’s media sponsors this year is Spicy IP, a blog which has not merely placed India firmly on the map so far as IP blogging is concerned, but has provided an invaluable source of information, ideas and critical comment at an impressively high level. It’s only a few years ago since blogs were still regarded with suspicion,…
Steelbird Hi-Tech India Ltd. v. S.P.S. Gambhir and Ors. Text of the judgement available here. The Delhi High Court recently (Feb. 24, 2014) vacated an ex-parte interim injunction granted in favour of helmet makers Steelbird. Justice Manmohan Singh ruled that the registered design on the basis of which Steelbird had initiated infringement proceedings against S.P.S Gambhir and Others was not “new or original”. Facts of the Case: Steelbird Hi-Tech India Ltd. is a company that is engaged in the business…
Image from here A reference (order available here) was made to a Full Bench of the Delhi High Court to consider as to what amounts to ‘prior publication’ under the Design Act, 2000. Previously, mere publication of a design by a foreign patent office was held not to constitute prior publication (Dabour Ltd. v Amit Jain (Del HC) and Gopal Glass Works v Asst. Contoller of Patents and Designs (Cal HC)). However, this ratio was questioned as it seemed to…
(Image taken from here) This case involves an appeal filed against an order of the Controller of Patents & Designs, Kolkata under Section 19(1) of the Designs Act, 2000, canceling registered designs for “Insecticide Coil” in Class 12 belonging to the Respondent Reckitt Benckiser. The Supreme Court had to decide whether the Delhi High Court, wherein the appeal had been filed, had the jurisdiction to entertain the same. The Appellant was a company against whom the Respondent had brought a…
Continuing our discussion from the last two posts, we shall now move on to the judgment of the Division Bench of the Delhi High Court in Microfibres. Before I proceed any further, my apologies to the readers for the delay in rounding up this discussion. At the expense of sounding repetitive, here are the conclusions and propositions made in the last two posts.1. A work which is capable of being registered as a design under the Designs Act, 2000 would…