The Kyiv Pivnichny Economic Court of Appeals on August 10 granted the appeal of the state-owned financial institution Oschadbank (Kyiv) and rejected the claim of Sberbank of Russia to cancel the Sberbank trademark, the intellectual property rights to which belong to Oschadbank in the territory of Ukraine, according to the website of the state-owned bank.
“The case, which lasted four years is over … The victory in this case cannot be overestimated, since it is an important stage in the history of the defense of intellectual property rights by Oschadbank in the main court case, which concerns the prohibition of Russia’s Sberbank to illegally use the Sberbank brand,” Board Chairman of Oschadbank Andriy Pyshny said.
According to the press service of Oschadbank, at the end of four years of consideration of the case, there were three expert evaluations conducted and more than 100 applications of the parties were considered.
It is specified that the representatives of Sberbank of Russia have filed a lawsuit that the registration by Oschadbank of the Sberbank trademark in Ukraine violated their rights.
“This case emerged as a kind of protection in another case, which was initiated at one time by Oschadbank that tried in this way to protect the rights of its clients and customers, and put the record straight, since many citizens of Ukraine perceived and still continue to perceive the designation of Sberbank, associating it primarily with Oschadbank,” the lawyer of Oschadbank, Tetiana Yuschenko added in the video attached to the message on the website.
The press service of Oschadbank told Interfax-Ukraine that Oschadbank’s victory in this case confirms its right to the Sberbank trademark, but does not prohibit its Ukrainian subsidiary, the Russian Sberbank, from using the name of Sberbank.
It is specified that Oschadbank will continue to defend its rights in the consideration of its main lawsuit on the illegality of the renaming of Sberbank of Russia in Ukraine as Sberbank, which was filed in December 2016, in response to which Sberbank filed a counterclaim rejected by the Court of Appeals on August 10.
