Cisco Sues Apple for Trademark Infringement

Obligation to Protect Cisco’s iPhone Trademark in the face of a wilful violation

Cisco is searching the way to prevent Apple from infringing upon and deliberately copying and using Cisco’s registered iPhone trademark, therefore they announced that it has filed a lawsuit in United State District Court for the Northern District of California against Apple, Inc.

In year 2000, Cisco had owned the iPhone trademark after completing the acquisition of Inforgear, which previously owned the mark and sold iPhone products for several years.The original filing of Inforgear for the trademark dates to March 20, 1996. Since early last year, Linksys, a division of Cisco has been shipping a new family of iPhone products. However, on Dec, 18, Linksys expended the iPhone family with their additional products.

According to Mark Chandler, who is the senior vice president and general counsel of Cisco,“Cisco entered into negotiations with Apple in good faith after Apple repeatedly asked permission to use Cisco’s iPhone name.There is no doubt that Apple’s new phone is very exciting, but they should not be using our trademark without our permission.”

“Today’s iPhone is not tomorrow’s iPhone.The potential for convergence of the home phone, cell phone,work phone and PC is limitless, which is why it is so important for us to protect our brand,” he added.

With its lawsuit, Cisco is seeking injunctive relief to prevent Apple from infringing Cisco’s iPhone trademark. For more information about the Cisco iPhone product line, please kindly visit www.linksys.com/iphone.

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