Steven Newell wrote:
>
> "Bowen, Patrick" wrote:
>
> > While you are right it does not cost a fortune to register a trademark, it
> > does cost money. With the biggest point being, why NOW. BMW has owned
> > Triumph for over 6 years and has not bothered to do anything. Hmmm, they
> > sell off their unwanted scraps and now they register it. Maybe I am a bit
> > into anylizing corporate psychology, but people do things for a reason.
>
> Okay, but large corporations sometimes do things arbitrarily. <g> And
> often there is *no good reason* for a a corporations actions. Could
> have been a deadline like another trademark expiring, could have been
> routine procedure, could have been a miscommunication between a
> manager and secretary on a Friday afternoon. Or lawyers trying to meet
> their "important looking document filing" quotas for the month.* <g>
To repeat what Patrick started, the filing was for "parts and supplies."
Note that the filings must be specific, if it is filed for "G&S" ("Goods
and Services"). By contrast, here's the description of what the mark
stands for as filed by the Rover Group, Ltd., for MG:
=====================================================================================
MG
Goods and Services
IC 012. US 019 021 023 031 035 044. G & S: automobiles and structural
parts thereof
Mark Drawing Code
(3) DESIGN PLUS WORDS, LETTERS, AND/OR NUMBERS
=====================================================================================
Note that Rover also has filed the mark "MG" in other categories of
goods and services, to include manuals and model cars.
When doing a search for "Triumph" in the full mark field at the PTO
site, and "automobile" and "auto" in the G&S field, there were no
results.
Based on this, I would guess that BMW was just filing to grab something
that fell through the cracks in the sale of the Rover Group. As others
have mentioned last year and the year before, BMW has been very
aggressively defending its logos on the net, and in print. If BMW
intended, at any time in the future, to bring back the Triumph marque,
they would have registered the name and all logos in the specific
category of "automobiles and structural parts thereof." And, they have
not, at least not in the U.S.
This is not to say that they could not do so at a later date, providing
someone had not filed for same in the meantime.
BTW, I offered to Patrick that the filing fee was quite low, $170 or so.
In fact, it is a bit higher, and just went up on the 10th of this month.
Initial filing fee is now $325, and for renewal, $400. Still quite low.
Cheers.
--
Michael D. Porter
Roswell, NM
[mailto: mporter@zianet.com]
`70 GT6+ (being refurbished, slowly)
`71 GT6 Mk. III (organ donor)
`72 GT6 Mk. III (daily driver)
`64 TR4 (awaiting intensive care)
`80 TR7 (3.8 liter Buick-powered)
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