Recently, changes in Casio watches were found by a Chinese court to constitute trademark infringement.
The infringers’ conduct included: 1) selling counterfeit watch parts (watchcases and watchbands) bearing the Casio mark, and genuine Casio watches with counterfeit watchcases and watchbands, without advising consumers of the change; 2) changing lower-end Casio watches to higher-end styles and selling the same; and 3) changing Casio watches to the styles of third parties and replacing the Casio mark with third parties’ marks.
The court held that such changes would cause confusion about the origin of the products or injure the goodwill of the Casio mark, and thus that they constituted trademark infringement.
It frequently happens that a third party changes or repackages genuine products and resells the changed products to consumers. Legal practice has reached a universal consensus that a substantive change, in the absence of authorization from the original right owner, constitutes trademark infringement. This case again shows this consensus.
