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General Court: ZIECON (fig) v. CERCON)
In case T‑239/12, the General Court had to review the decision of the Board of Appeal regarding the following opposition
Jyoti Ceramic Industries PVT. Ltd (India) |
DeguDent GmbH (Germany) |
CERCON |
|
Classes 5, 10, 40 related to dental care and medicine |
Classes 5, 9 and 10 related to dental care and medicine |
The Opposition Division had rejected the opposition. It held that for the highly specialized consumer, with a higher degree of attention as well as technical knowledge, there is no likelihood of confusion between the signs due to the visual, aural differences at the beginning of the signs and conceptual differences-the contested CTM will be associated to zircon whereas the earlier CTM won’t.
The Board of Appeal, as upheld by the General Court, found that the consumer is both professional and average (for Class 40 goods ‘material treatment’). It confirmed that the goods and services are either identical or similar. However, the signs are similar from a visual and aural point of view, and lack conceptual meaning in EU languages, or eventually both will be perceived as zircon. Thus, even if the earlier mark is interpreted as having a lower than average distinctive character, there is a likelihood of confusion between the signs according to Article 8 (1) b) CTMR.
Posted by: Laetitia Lagarde @ 16.59Tags: general court, likelihoof of confusion, cercon, ziecon, dental,,
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