YouView says it intends to appeal against a High Court ruling that it had infringed a trademark owned by Cheltenham-based communications company Total Ltd.
Total argued YouView was in breach of the trademarks act because the PSB-telco TV venture is using the trademark, identical to its own YOUR VIEW mark, for goods and services identical or similar to those offered by itself.
The company says it will now seek and injunction preventing further use of the name ‘YouView’ along with financial compensation and payment of court costs.
Lorrin White, Managing Director of Total said: “Whilst Total may not compare to YouView in terms of size, we both operate in the same industry space. We protect our rights to brand ownership and wholeheartedly defend those rights – as any business should –otherwise we would never have registered our marks in the first place. Our integrated YourView products are core to the long term strategy of Total. We are a business that respects our partners, competitors and the wider industry, but YouView have persisted in their infringement of our registered mark, leaving us no option but to take action through the courts.”
A spokesperson for YouView told Broadband TV News: “We plan to appeal against the court’s decision, as we maintain there is no confusion between our consumer-facing TV service, YouView, and the business-to-business billing platform, Yourview, provided by Total Ltd.”
Originally known as Project Canvas, YouView applied to use the YouView mark in lower case in April 2010.
