{"id":2997,"date":"2003-05-05T00:00:00","date_gmt":"2003-05-05T03:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/ids.org.br\/novo-site\/en\/former-ford-dealers-may-use-ford-mark\/"},"modified":"2003-05-05T00:00:00","modified_gmt":"2003-05-05T03:00:00","slug":"former-ford-dealers-may-use-ford-mark","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/ids.org.br\/en\/former-ford-dealers-may-use-ford-mark\/","title":{"rendered":"Former Ford Dealers May Use FORD Mark"},"content":{"rendered":"<p style=\"text-align: justify\"><span style=\"color: #505050\"><span style=\"font-size: x-small\"><span style=\"font-family: Verdana\">The Court of Appeals for the Federal District has held in a majority opinion that the Brazilian Association of Former Ford Distributors is not infringing Ford Motor Company&#8217;s trademark rights in FORD because the association&#8217;s name is used for non-commercial purposes (Case 2001.01.1.014235-0).<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #505050\"><span style=\"font-size: x-small\"><span style=\"font-family: Verdana\">The association was created to defend former Ford car dealers from alleged acts and omissions by Ford Brasil. Ford initiated a court action claiming that the use of &#8216;Ford&#8217; in the association&#8217;s name infringes Ford&#8217;s trademark rights. Ford pointed out that the FORD mark is protected by the Paris Convention for the Protection of Industrial Property, and the Brazilian Constitution and Industrial Property Law. <\/span><\/span><\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #505050\"><span style=\"font-size: x-small\"><span style=\"font-family: Verdana\">The Civil Court of the Federal District ordered the association to stop using the mark but denied Ford&#8217;s request for damages. Both parties appealed.<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #505050\"><span style=\"font-size: x-small\"><span style=\"font-family: Verdana\">The Court of Appeals for the Federal District held that (i) the ex-dealers have the right to identify themselves as &#8216;former Ford distributors&#8217; as a matter of fact, and (ii) this use is not commercial and, therefore, out of the reach of the protection afforded by domestic law and the Paris Convention. <\/span><\/span><\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #505050\"><span style=\"font-size: x-small\"><span style=\"font-family: Verdana\">In a concurring opinion, Judge Silv&acirc;nio Barbosa dos Santos stated that the association&#8217;s use of &#8216;Ford&#8217; is insufficient to sustain a claim for moral damages, but that a civil action for recovery of economic damages may be filed if the association tarnishes the FORD mark or Ford&#8217;s reputation in any way. <\/span><\/span><\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #505050\"><span style=\"font-size: x-small\"><span style=\"font-family: Verdana\">In a dissenting opinion, Judge Carmelita Brasil held that (i) the law grants special protection to famous trademarks such as FORD, even in the absence of competition, and (ii) the association&#8217;s use of the name has already tarnished the mark. Brasil also found that the name &#8216;Ford&#8217; &#8211; the famous founder of the company &#8211; is protected based on personal rights, which are absolute. <\/span><\/span><\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #505050\"><span style=\"font-size: x-small\"><span style=\"font-family: Verdana\">Ford has appealed.<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The Court of Appeals for the Federal District has held in a majority opinion that the Brazilian Association of Former Ford Distributors is not infringing Ford Motor Company&#8217;s trademark rights in FORD because the association&#8217;s name is used for non-commercial purposes (Case 2001.01.1.014235-0). The association was created to defend former Ford car dealers from alleged [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[106],"tags":[135],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/ids.org.br\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2997"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/ids.org.br\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/ids.org.br\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ids.org.br\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ids.org.br\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2997"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/ids.org.br\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2997\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/ids.org.br\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2997"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ids.org.br\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2997"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ids.org.br\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2997"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}