Trademark Trolls Claiming Automotive Brands For Profit

Cameron Aubernon
by Cameron Aubernon

The bane of many a startup and established company alike, trademark trolls now have their sights set on the auto industry.

Portage, Ind.-based Trademark King, Inc. began filing trademark protection claims on 155 names and domains around Thanksgiving of last year, AutoGuide reports. The claims include everything from “Selection Sunday” and “Warren Buffet,” to “Porsche.com” and “Kia.com.”

According to the filings, the trademark troll is staking its claim to these names for “brand development and evaluation services in the field of trademarks, trade names, and domain names,” as well as “creating trademarks for others.” For the right price, however, the company would sell or lease the name “to anyone in the world for a legal business activity.”

And how much did Douglas LeHockey, the owner of Trademark King – the company and the trademark – pay for this trouble? According to Domain Name Wire, $50,000.

When interviewed by the publication about another trademark filing related to an established domain name, LeHockey said it didn’t matter who had the domain name first, but who filed the trademark first, adding he would have his lawyer send a cease-and-desist to the domain owner.

[Photo credit: ngader/ Flickr/ CC BY 2.0]

Cameron Aubernon
Cameron Aubernon

Seattle-based writer, blogger, and photographer for many a publication. Born in Louisville. Raised in Kansas. Where I lay my head is home.

More by Cameron Aubernon

Comments
Join the conversation
7 of 38 comments
  • Pch101 Pch101 on May 05, 2015

    He would have had better luck lighting the $50,000 on fire.

    • 05lgt 05lgt on May 06, 2015

      My experience went like this: "You've had no sales, that's no commerce and no right. Get off my mark or I'll waste your money and still get it." Crazily enough, it worked.

  • Charliej Charliej on May 05, 2015

    Businesses tend to hate have to spend money on frivolous crap. I am really surprised that patent trolls and their ilk are not found dead in a ditch somewhere. It seems like poking a mega corporation with a sharp stick would be a bad idea.

  • Flipper35 Flipper35 on May 06, 2015

    The issue with the domain names has been through the courts many times and the courts have almost always ruled in favor of the established brand. That said: "while use of a trademark as a domain name to extort money from the markholder or to prevent that markholder from using the domain name may be per se dilution, a legitimate competing use of the domain name is not. Holders of a famous mark are not automatically entitled to use that mark as their domain name; trademark law does not support such a monopoly. If another Internet user has an innocent and legitimate reason for using the famous mark as a domain name and is the first to register it, that user should be able to use the domain name, provided that it has not otherwise infringed upon or diluted the trademark."

    • See 1 previous
    • Danio3834 Danio3834 on May 06, 2015

      @Mark Stevenson I remarked that also. That struggle has been ongoing for many years and most recently Nissan is trying to do something similar to what the guy in this article is doing, trying to capture the domain via trademark.

  • JPaulV JPaulV on May 08, 2015

    Domain registration however does not allow people to register a domain name that is the same as someone's registered trademark. It is relatively easy for a trademark holder to notify the domain registration authority that their trademark is being used by someone who does not own the trademark and the domain holder is shut down. If the person tries to re-register the domain name they can be banned from ever getting any domain name. In the USA you cannot sit on trademarks, you have to prove you are using the trademark. When I saw the title of the article I thought for sure it was going to be about China.

Next