Jan

12

Cisco’s iPhone Trademark Invalid?

January 12, 2007 |

And once again we hit another twist in the daily (hourly?) iPhone saga. According to ZDNet reporter Ed Burnette, Cisco’s trademark for the ‘iPhone’ name might be declared invalid because it wasn’t used for six years after registering the name on 11/16/1999 and the documentation for the use of the name in those years was a picture of a box with a sticker saying ‘iPhone.’ I will sit back and watch these two fight - should be interesting.

According to Jay Behmke, a partner at CMPR who specializes in trademark law,

The Cisco iPhone trademark was registered 11/16/1999
(Reg. No. 2293011). In order to keep a trademark registration active,
you have to file a Declaration of Use on or before the sixth
anniversary of the registration date, in which you state, under penalty
of perjury, that you have been using the trademark continuously during
that period. The sixth anniversary would have been 11/16/2005.

Cisco did not file the Declaration of Use by 11/16/2005, which if
they had been using the trademark would seemingly have been easy to do.
However, the USPTO gives you an extra six months grace period, if you
pay an extra fee. This grace period would have expired 5/16/2006. Cisco
filed a Declaration of Use on 5/4/2006 which kept their registration
active. Had they not filed, their registration would have been canceled.

With the Declaration, you are required to file a copy of a label or
other packaging showing the trademark in use. Cisco filed a picture of
the box for the Linksys iPhone.

CIT200 - iPhone or not?

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