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Importing EU Norms pp 169–188Cite as

Reception of EU Trade Mark Law in New Zealand

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Part of the book series: United Nations University Series on Regionalism ((UNSR,volume 8))

Abstract

European trade mark norms found their way into the World Trade Organisation’s agreement on Trade Related aspects of Intellectual Property Rights (WTO TRIPs) and into the law of New Zealand, a WTO member state. This chapter charts the journey of those norms by analysing treaty and legislative texts as well as the processes leading to TRIPs. It questions whether New Zealand law has taken on problematic aspects of EU trade mark law as well as beneficial ones. The chapter’s processes and findings exemplify the book’s theoretical framework of norm reception—adoption, adaptation, resistance and rejection. New Zealand law has proved resistant to the problems under study, whilst successfully adopting beneficial aspects and adapting them to local conditions.

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Notes

  1. 1.

    The phrase and the underlying model of diffusion of legal norms are Watson’s: Alan Watson Legal Transplants: An Approach to Comparative Law (Edinburgh 1974). A ‘Bibliography on Legal Transplants and the Diffusion of Law’ may be found at http://www.alanwatson.org/readings.html, including work critical of the theory. See also Garcia and Masselot in this volume.

  2. 2.

    Nuno Pires de Carvalho (2012) argues that all intellectual property serves a differentiating function.

  3. 3.

    Examples of ‘brands’ and their global rankings may be found at http://www.interbrand.com/en/best-global-brands/2013/top-100-list-view.aspx. Leading brands and sectors include ‘APPLE’/technology; ‘COCA-COLA’/soft drinks; ‘VISA’/credit cards; ‘MERCEDES-BENZ’/motor cars.

  4. 4.

    WIPO remarks that a trade mark protection system ‘helps consumers identify and purchase a product or service because its nature and quality, indicated by its unique trademark, meets their needs’: http://www.wipo.int/trademarks/en/trademarks.html.

  5. 5.

    http://www.wipo.int/trademarks/en/about_trademarks.html#function.

  6. 6.

    Chronopolous (2011) analyses the operation and proper scope of trade mark law by placing it within a wider set of norms regulating the competitive process.

  7. 7.

    Ian Finch (2012, p. 3), referring to legal recognition of trade mark licensing.

  8. 8.

    Jonathan B Wiener (2001, p. 1371) describes the transplanting of national regulatory text into international law as ‘…selecting a bit of regulatory DNA from national law, inserting it into an international law embryo, and hoping that this new legal hybrid will grow to be a hardy offspring…’.

  9. 9.

    Subsequent development of European case-law in this area, in the shape of Case C-323/09 Interflora v Marks & Spencer [2012] FSR 3, is considered briefly below.

  10. 10.

    Council Directive 89/104/EEC to approximate the laws of the Member States relating to trade marks, 21 December 1988, [2009] OJ L40/1, later replaced by codified version 2008/95/EC, 22 October 2008, [2008] OJ L299/25, implemented by way of the UK Trade Marks Act 1994.

  11. 11.

    Council Regulation (EC) No 40/94 of 20 December 1993 on the Community trade mark, [1994] OJ L11/1, replaced by codified Reg (EC) 207/2009 of 26 February 2009 [2009] OJ L78/1.

  12. 12.

    The TRIPs agreement is Annex 1C to the Final Act of the Marrakesh Agreement Establishing the World Trade Organisation (Marrakesh, 15 April 1994). http://www.wto.org/english/tratop_e/trips_e/trips_e.htm.

  13. 13.

    Accessible via links at http://www.wto.org/english/tratop_e/trips_e/trips_e.htm. Christopher Wadlow (2007) identifies a conveniently searchable database of these travaux preparatoires in the shape of Stanford University’s GATT Digital Library at http://gatt.stanford.edu/page/home.

  14. 14.

    GNG stands for ‘Group of Negotiations of Goods’ and NG11 for ‘Negotiating Group on Trade-Related Aspects of Intellectual Property Rights, including Trade in Counterfeit Goods’. The drafts may also be searched and sourced at http://gatt.stanford.edu/page/home; http://sul-derivatives.stanford.edu/derivative?CSNID=92100042&mediaType=application/pdf.

  15. 15.

    See, now, the trade mark pages of the Office for Harmonization in the Internal Market (‘OHIM’, the Community Trade Mark and Design registration Office) at http://oami.europa.eu/ows/rw/pages/index.en.do.

  16. 16.

    MTN.GNG/NG11/21 of June 22, 1990.

  17. 17.

    MTN.GNG/NG11/W/76; trade marks provisions are at p 18–23. http://sul-derivatives.stanford.edu/derivative?CSNID=92110034&mediaType=application/pdf.

  18. 18.

    http://sul-derivatives.stanford.edu/derivative?CSNID=92120144&mediaType=application/pdf.

  19. 19.

    Document MTN.TNC/W/FA of 20 December 1991 TRIPS is at pp Y57–90. http://gatt.stanford.edu/bin/detail?fileID=430670083X.

  20. 20.

    Alongside the Marrakesh agreement creating the WTO on 15 April 1994. As the WTO puts it ‘The ʻFinal Act’ signed in Marrakesh in 1994 is like a cover note. Everything else is attached to this. Foremost is the Agreement Establishing the WTO (or the WTO Agreement), which serves as an umbrella agreement. Annexed are the agreements on goods, services and intellectual property [which is Annex 1C], dispute settlement, trade policy review mechanism and the plurilateral agreements. The schedules of commitments also form part of the Uruguay Round agreements.ʼ http://www.wto.org/english/docs_e/legal_e/legal_e.htm#TRIPs.

  21. 21.

    Hong Kong’s Trade Marks Ordinance 2003, (Cap. 559); the Hong Kong database of trademark cases contains many decisions referring to UK, EU and Commonwealth case law: http://www.ipd.gov.hk/eng/intellectual_property/trademarks/trademarks_decisions/cap559.htm.

  22. 22.

    Sumpter (2010) puts it thus ‘The New Zealand Trade Marks Act 2002, again largely cut and pasted from the United Kingdom (and therefore European) law’ and notes that European law comes ‘complete with the, largely incomprehensible, European Court of Justice decisions’. The latter sentiment is echoed by Jacob LJ in O2 Holdings Ltd v Hutchison 3G Ltd [2006] EWCA Civ 1656 at [35].

  23. 23.

    The text of the Singaporean statute, Cap332, may be consulted at http://statutes.agc.gov.sg/aol/home.w3p.

  24. 24.

    For a history of the fair use defence in the US, now encoded as § 33(b)(4) of the Federal ‘Lanham’ trade mark Act, see, eg, Fuller (2006). For argument that there is growing convergence between EU and US legislation and judicial doctrines in relation to defenses, see Ramsey and Schovsbo(2013).

  25. 25.

    MTN.GNG/NG11/W/26. Thanks to Prof Duncan Matthews, Queen Mary, University of London.

  26. 26.

    Document MTN.GNG/NG11/W/26 of 8 July 1988, (Pires de Carvalho 2006).

  27. 27.

    MTN.GNG/NG11/W/16.

  28. 28.

    Directive, Art 7; Regulation Art. 13

  29. 29.

    Case C-355/96 Silhouette International Schmied GmbH & Co KG v Hartlauer Handelsgesellschaft mbH [1998] ECR I-4799 and subsequent cases, including case C-173/98 Sebago Inc v GB Unic SA [1999] ECR I-4013; case C-414/99 Zino Davidoff SA v A&G Imports Ltd [2001] ECR I-8691; case C-16/03 Peak Holding AB v Axolin-Elinor AB [2005] ETMR 28.

  30. 30.

    Art 6 TRIPs states ‘For the purposes of dispute settlement under this Agreement, subject to the provisions of Articles 3 and 4 nothing in this Agreement shall be used to address the issue of the exhaustion of intellectual property rights.’

  31. 31.

    MTN.GNG/NG11/W/32/Rev. 1.

  32. 32.

    Trade Marks Act 2002, s 95.

  33. 33.

    Sect. 97A, as substituted by s16 of the Trade Marks Amendment Act 2011.

  34. 34.

    Interestingly, one finds examples of reference to EU jurisprudence even here—for example on the concept of ‘consent’: Leisureworld Ltd v Elite Fitness Equipment Ltd HC AK CIV 2006-404-3499 [2006] NZHC 849 (21 July 2006), following Joined Cases C-414 to 416/99 Zino Davidoff v A&C Imports [2001] ECR I-869, noted by Finch 2012 at p. 604.

  35. 35.

    Eg Intellectual Reserve Inc v Sintes [2009] NZCA 305 at [22].

  36. 36.

    Despite recognition at Sect. 00, para 3.2.2 of IPONZ’s trademark Guidelines that the classic case on distinctiveness, W&G du Cros Ltd’s Application (1913) 30 RPC 660 might no longer be the most appropriate, given the change in wording of the Act, perusal of cases noted as significant in NZJIP for 2011 and 2012 shows frequent citation of W&G du Cros.

  37. 37.

    Notably respondents to surveys for the Max-Planck 2011‘Study on the Overall Functioning of the European Trade Mark System’, coordinated by Annette Kur, Reto Hilty and Roland Knaak, available at http://ec.europa.eu/internal_market/indprop/docs/tm/20110308_allensbach-study_en.pdf.

  38. 38.

    See pp. 39–40.

  39. 39.

    Cited by the Max Planck Study, which recommends at p270 that OHIM charge per class, and von Gravenitz et al. 2012, p. 32.

  40. 40.

    Goods and services are divided into 34 classes for goods and 11 for services in the international classification founded and updated under the Nice Agreement of 1957. The classification is widely used by trade mark offices around that world to structure their registers, reducing searching costs and the complexity of international registration of marks.

  41. 41.

    The application identified services by reference to the heading of class 41, ʻEducation; providing of training; entertainment; sporting and cultural activities’.

  42. 42.

    Case C-307/10 Chartered Institute of Patent Attorneys v Registrar of Trade Marks 19 June 2012. [2013] RPC 11; ECJ (Grand Chamber).

  43. 43.

    Resulting in ‘Common Communication on the Implementation of `IP Translatorʼ v1.1, 20 November 2013.

  44. 44.

    Eg the (Invented) Name Review Group of the European Medicines Agency. See von Graevenitz August 2012.

  45. 45.

    Von Graeventiz (August 2012, 13); Directive 2008/95/EC, Art 10; Regulation (EC) No 207/2009, Art 15.

  46. 46.

    http://www.iponz.govt.nz/cms/trade-marks/fees.

  47. 47.

    ‘The Commissioner must not register a trade mark in respect of all of the goods and services included in a class, or a large variety of goods or services, unless the specification is justified by the use or intended use of the sign.’

  48. 48.

    http://www.iponz.govt.nz/cms/trade-marks/practice-guidelines-index.

  49. 49.

    See IPONZ trade mark Guidelines, Sect. 02A, para 2.2.

  50. 50.

    Case C-383/99 P Procter & Gamble v OHIM (BABY DRY Trade Mark) [2001] CEC 325. See the caution expressed on the significance of lexical invention by IPONZ in its trade mark Guidelines at Sect. 05, para 4.2.6, citing McCain Foods (Aust) Pty Ltd v Conagra Inc (6 June 2002) unreported, Court of Appeal CA176/01(HEALTHY CHOICE).

  51. 51.

    Case C-191/01P OHIM v Wm Wrigley Company [2003] ECR I-12447 at [32] (Judgment of the court: Presiding, Skouris P; Jann, Timmermans, Gulmann, Cunha Rodrigues and Rosas PP.C.; Edward, La Pergola, Puissochet (Rapporteur), Schintgen, Macken, Colneric and von Bahr, Rosas JJ.).

  52. 52.

    As indicated by a search on NZLII.

  53. 53.

    Case C-517/99 Merz & Krell GmbH & Co [2001] ETMR 105.

  54. 54.

    The New Zealand equivalent is found in s18(1) ‘The Commissioner must not register- … (d) a trade mark that consists only of signs or indications that have become customary in the current language or in the bona fide practices of trade’.

  55. 55.

    Case C-517/99 Merz & Krell GmbH & Co [2001] ETMR 105 at Order, para 2, second sentence.

  56. 56.

    Build-a-Bear Workshop Inc’s Appl IPO T01/2007, upheld on appeal HC Wellington CIV-2007-485-196.

  57. 57.

    Charlies’ Trading Ltd v Frucor Beverages IPO T25/2007.

  58. 58.

    Marexim Import-Export Ltd’s Appl IPO T10/2007.

  59. 59.

    IPO T02/2010, upheld on appeal, Coombe v Coca-Cola Amaril (NZ) Ltd (2011) 9 NZBLC 103. The mark is actually used on a lemon and piroa flavour.

  60. 60.

    Case C-2/00 Hölterhoff v Friesleben [2002] ECR. I-4187.

  61. 61.

    Hölterhoff at [17] In O2 Holdings Ltd v Hutchison 3G Ltd [2006] EWCA Civ 1656 at [36] Jacob LJ noted that invalidity could also have been pleaded.

  62. 62.

    Case C-206/01 [2003] ETMR 19.

  63. 63.

    Morcom 2012, 43, referring specifically to case C-278/08 Die BergSpechte Outdoor Reisen und Alpinschule Edi Koblmuller GmbH v Guni [2010] ETMR 33 (ECJ).

  64. 64.

    [2003] EWCA Civ 696; [2003] E.T.M.R. 73 at [48]. See, also, case C-323/09 Interflora Inc. and Interflora British Unit v. Marks & Spencer plc et Flowers Direct Online Ltd [2012] FSR 3.

  65. 65.

    Case C-236/08 Google France Sarl v Louis Vuitton Malletier SA [2011] All E.R. (EC) 411 (ECJ (Grand Chamber)).

  66. 66.

    ‘Subsection (1) [infringement] only applies if the sign is used in such a manner as to render the use of the sign as likely to be taken as being use as a trade mark.’

  67. 67.

    Sumpter (2011, p. 184) suggests that it includes implicit comparison.

  68. 68.

    ‘Code for Comparative Advertising’, January 2013, available at http://www.asa.co.nz/revisedcodes.php.

  69. 69.

    EU law contains a similar definition ‘Any advertising, that explicitly or by implication, identifies a competitor or goods or services offered by a competitor’: Art. 2a of Directive 84/450/EEC on misleading advertising, as amended by Directive 97/55/EC to include comparative advertising; consolidated text available at http://ec.europa.eu/consumers/cons_int/safe_shop/mis_adv/index_en.htm; ‘The test for determining whether an advertisement is comparative in nature is thus whether it identifies, explicitly or by implication, a competitor of the advertiser or goods or services which the competitor offers.’ Case C-533/06 O2 Holdings Ltd v Hutchinson 3G UK Ltd [2008] 3 CMLR 14. And see case C-657/11 Belgian Electronic Sorting Technology NV v Peelaers [2013] ETMR 45: ‘advertising’ includes use of a domain name, but not its registration, and use of metatags.

  70. 70.

    Pumfrey J. in Pag Ltd v Hawke-Woods Ltd [2002] ETMR 70; [2002] FSR 46 Ch D at [24].

  71. 71.

    ‘Misleading Advertising Directive’ 84/450/EEC, in due course amended by Directive 97/55/EC to include comparative advertising and again by Directive 2005/29/EC concerning unfair business-to-consumer commercial practices.

  72. 72.

    Barclays Bank v RBS Advanta [1996] RPC 307; http://www.wipo.int/treaties/en/ip/paris/.

  73. 73.

    [2001] FSR 32. Although the advertisement was withdrawn after the UK Advertising Standard Authority had upheld a claim of offensiveness.

  74. 74.

    [2003] NZCA 213; [2004] 1 NZLR 26. Although s94 was not in force when the cause of action arose, it was considered relevant to the continuation of an injunction.

  75. 75.

    Although the Court of Justice went beyond its remit by ruling that there was no confusion, contrary to the findings of fact by the English High Court.

  76. 76.

    L’Oreal v Bellure [2010] EWCA Civ 535 at [6]–[7].

  77. 77.

    N. 70 above.

  78. 78.

    Contrary to Art. 3a(1)(h) of the Misleading Advertising Directive.

  79. 79.

    Contrary to Art. 3a(1)(g) of the directive.

  80. 80.

    Interflora Inc v Marks & Spencer plc (No 2) [2010] EWHC 925 (Ch) per Arnold J at [17]; for subsequent developments, including CJEU rulings, see [2013] EWHC 1291 (Ch); [2013] FSR 33.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. University of Newcastle, Newcastle, UK

    Alison Firth

  2. Queen Mary University of London, London, UK

    Alison Firth

  3. University of Surrey, Guildford, UK

    Alison Firth

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  1. Department of Political Science, University of Lund, Lund, Sweden

    Annika Björkdahl

  2. National Centre for Research on Europe, University of Canterbury, Christchurch, New Zealand

    Natalia Chaban

  3. Victoria University of Wellington, Wellington, New Zealand

    John Leslie

  4. College of Business and Law, University of Canterbury, Christchurch, New Zealand

    Annick Masselot

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Firth, A. (2015). Reception of EU Trade Mark Law in New Zealand. In: Björkdahl, A., Chaban, N., Leslie, J., Masselot, A. (eds) Importing EU Norms. United Nations University Series on Regionalism, vol 8. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-13740-7_11

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