"Swiss made", "Made in Switzerland" and the Swiss cross are valuable brands - a study estimates that labelling a product "Swiss made" can add up to 20% to its price. Small wonder that everybody would like to call their products Swiss made - but not everybody likes to pay the price, because producing in Switzerland is expensive. The Federal government has now proposed to clarify the regulations on geographical indications and proposes the following rules, which must be met for a product to be legally labelled "Swiss made":

• For natural products, the criteria depends on the type of product. For plants, the place where the plant is harvested is essential, for meat, the place where the animal has lived the most part of its life;
• for processed natural products (most food stuffs), at least 80% of the ingredients in weight must originate from Switzerland. There are exceptions for raw materials that are not produced in Switzerland - think cacao, if 80% of the weight of a chocolate bar's ingredients had to come from Switzerland, there would be no Swiss chocolate;
• for industrial products: at least 60% of the manufacturing cost has to be incurred in Switzerland, research and development count as manufacturing cost. The total value of the good does not include the value of raw materials that cannot be found (in sufficient quantities) in Switzerland - think gold watch: the gold (which is not found in Switzerland) may constitue 80% of the watch's value, even if the watch is made entirely in Switzerland, the 60% threshold would not be met if the gold counted towards the total value;
• as a cumulative additional requirement for processed natural products and industrial products, the manufacturing step that gives the product its substantial characteristics (e.g. turning milk into cheese) also has to occur in Switzerland;
• services may be called "Swiss made" if the service provider has its seat and at least one actual place of business in Switzerland.

If the criteria above are met, the Swiss cross may also be used on goods (until now, it can only be used for services, but this provision has been largely ignored). It is proposed that geographical indications can be protected for non-agricultural goods, too (e.g. "Genève" for watches).

The criteria are detailed and will undoubtedly give room for disputes in borderline cases. Given the stakes involved, one may expect that the wording of the amendment will change during parliamentary debate.  Class46 will keep you posted.

More information here.

French-based champagne house Champagne Louis Roederer as recently succeeded in a dispute with the Russian Federal state-owned enterprise Soyuzplodoimport, a vodka manufacturer, concerning its well-known CRISTAL trade mark. According to information supplied to Class 46 by law firm Hogan & Hartson, which represented the French company,

"Cristal Louis Roederer Champagne originally was produced specially for Russian Emperor Alexander II in 1876. In 1949 the trade mark was internationally registered and in 1995 it obtained legal protection in Russia. However, in April this year, the Russian Сhamber for Patent Disputes terminated the legal protection of the "Cristal" trade mark in Russia. Soyuzplodoimport, being the rights-holder of the Russian trade mark "Kristal" for vodka (registered in Russia in 1973), stated that the "Cristal" and "Kristal" trade marks were confusingly similar and ordered the French company to pay royalties for the imported champagne.

On 6 July the Louis Roederer Company challenged the chamber’s decision in the Moscow Arbitration Court. At the opening sitting, Rospatent (the Russian Agency for Patents and Trade Marks) acknowledged that the French company was in the right and that the decision of the chamber was erroneous. ... Soyuzplodoimport had missed the period for challenging the trade mark registration, which is five years from the date of publication of the information on the grant of legal protection to the Cristal trade mark. The court affirmed the legal protection of the Cristal trade mark and reversed the decision of the Russian Сhamber for Patent Disputes. Cristal Champagne can now freely continue to be imported into Russia".

The decision of the Moscow Arbitration Court was delivered on 26 October 2009.

“The idea is to sell USB drives using this brand. We saw that it was not already allocated to someone else. It was not registered.”

The Pirate Bay’s owner's, who sold the domain name for a reported $8 million, are reported as having told TorrentFreak that they would challenge this registration.

Source: "Swedish Retailer Pirates the Pirate Bay Logo" in Wired, with thanks to Jean-François Vanden Eynde (eBrand Services FBS S.A. - EuroDNS) for supplying the link.