Trade mark decision

BL Number

O/116/04

Decision date

27 April 2004

Hearing Officer

Mr J MacGillivray

Mark

OPTITEC

Classes

09, 19, 21

Applicant

Pilkington Plc

Opponent

Optiroc Group AB

Opposition

Section 5(2)(b)

Result

Section 5(2)(b) - Opposition failed.

Points Of Interest

• 1. None

Summary

The opponent’s opposition was based on their ownership of a number of registrations consisting of or incorporating the mark OPTIROC in particular in Class 19 in respect of identical goods as those of the applicant.

Under Section 5(2)(b) the only matter for consideration by the Hearing Officer was a comparison of the respective marks OPTITEC and OPTIROC. In his consideration the Hearing Officer noted that the opponent’s mark OPTIROC was a distinctive mark deserving of a good penumbra of protection. However, evidence filed by the applicant indicated that the opponent did not possess a monopoly of marks with the prefix OPTI.

Despite the fact that the respective marks shared the first four letters OPTI and the final letter ‘c’ the Hearing Officer considered that comparing the marks in their totality, the suffixes TEC and ROC would be apparent to users. He thus considered the marks to be visually, phonetically and conceptually different. Overall he did not think there was a likelihood of confusion. Opposition thus failed.

Full decision O/116/04 33Kb