Automotive News [sub] reports a Turin [Italy] court has banned the Great Wall GWPeri from European sales. The court agrees with Fiat's assessment that the car "is a (Fiat) Panda with a different front end." The court ordered Great Wall to pay Fiat about $24k for the first imported model, and nearly $80k for each future import. Great Wall's lawyers say they'll appeal the decision. Fiat is also suing Great Wall in China, where the Panda isn't even sold. That case is still pending. It's been rumored that Great Wall has been interested in the U.S. market for some time, so let me be the first to say, bring the GWPeri here! The Panda's supposed to be a fun little car, and our own struggling automakers could use a captive import or two right now. Bring it as a Chevy, and let Fiat angrily nurse its $2b of GM's money. Either way, this is clearly a sign of things to come. Up next, lawsuits over this (Great Wall) Scion xB, this (SG) RX300, this (Lifan) MINI Cooper, this HUMMER, etc, etc. Hell, Great Wall even stole its GWPeri ad from an old Citroen C4 spot. Talk about incorrigible.
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Methinks it might have some difficulty passing crash test standards.
The 4 door Mini clone ( minime?) looks interesting.
If U sleep with the Fleas U wake up with the Dogs.
Thats only fair when Patent law somehow has to be enforced in the original country.
So the whole EU can clamp down on the knock off Panda.
I’m constantly blown away by the utter shamelessness of the Chinese auto manufacturers, and the fact that it’s ONLY the Chinese that do this. (Disclaimer: I’m Chinese.) I have a Korean phone that’s touted to be an iPhone clone, but guess what? It looks different! It does more! The Chinese need to figure out how to make a car that’s distinctly Chinese, and not just by being plasticky and cheap.
And there’s no guarantee that a faux Panda would behave anything like the real one. It could drive like garbage truck for all we know.
Suddenly, I’m reminded of all those discount-store knockoffs of name-brand toys I had as a kid. They weren’t really bad toys, but you knew they weren’t the real thing. If you could stomach the ridicule from your friends, they were cheap fun.
I really don’t know if these are a legitimate threat to Lexus, Hummer, BMW/Mini or suchlike image any more than “Roxel” watches are a threat to Rolex. Scion or FIAT might be more vulnerable, but any country with trademark laws essentially obviates any real concern.
Blowfish: this is trademark or copyright, not patent, law. In the case of China it moot because they run roughshod over both, but patents are easy to enforce; trademarks are more touchy-feely.
It could drive like garbage truck for all we know.
Better hope is crashes like a garbage truck compared to the squashing grapes test the Chinese have already shown in the crash worthiness of their cars.
TTAC needs a foreign tester to give us reviews of the cars the Chinese are buying up, if for nothing other than comic relief.
Redbarchetta Says:
July 18th, 2008 at 5:24 pm
TTAC needs a foreign tester to give us reviews of the cars the Chinese are buying up, if for nothing other than comic relief.
This could be a job for Solowiow.
In the modern era, China has unfortunately been a nation characterized by submission rather than leadership – how else could a brilliant sociopath like Mao kill 30 million of his own people in peacetime?
Innovative auto industry in China? That’s laughable – they can’t even build a decent AK clone, and I know; here in Afghanistan I see their crap all over the place, and the local insurgents do all they can to rush out and trade in their Nanking Specials for a Hungarian-made ADM-65.
And I thought TTAC was making a commentary on the EU’s ban on GM foods…
“The 4 door Mini clone ( minime?) looks interesting.”
Ironic when you consider the Mini itself is a grotesque pastiche of something else.
A bigger threat to trademark and copyright holders is the duplication of digital media. In that case, the “knock off” is (often) just as good as the original. Plus, for the freight cost of importing a single car or truck you could have thousands of CDs or DVDs.
Then there are fake items like Prada hand bags. Sure, the original might be a little bit better made, but the knock-off is so inexpensive that, if it falls apart in a year or two you just buy another one. I think most of the people who buy that stuff tire of it in a year or two anyway and move on to some other fashion statement.
With cars coming to the US and Europe, I think the trademark and copyright holders will indeed succeed in keeping them out.
As usual, the Chinese continue flooding western markets with cheap manufactured goods, the goods where they clearly have a comparative advantage in trade, while refusing to pay for the products for which the west clearly has an upper hand (movies, software, electronics and car designs, etc). They simply rip off the designs, styles, brands, and copy everything completely ignoring intellectual property rights. No wonder our trade deficit with China is a whooping $120B.