This Is A Ford Truck
You think only China has a total disregard for intellectual property? Ford filed a trademark infringement suit on Wednesday against a foreign carmaker. The only thing this carmaker has in common with China is their love for the red color. Ford sued Ferrari for blatantly stealing the name of the world’s best selling vehicle, the F-150.
Ferrari named its 2011 Formula 1 racing car the “F150.” And Ferrari’s F150 logo bears striking resemblance to the one on Ford’s F-150 pickup truck, Ford said in a complaint filed in U.S. District Court in Detroit.
Ford alleges that “Ferrari has misappropriated the F-150 trademark in naming its new racing vehicle the ‘F150’ in order to capitalize on and profit from the substantial goodwill that Ford has developed in the F-150 trademark.”
Yes, Ford says that Ferrari’s Formula 1 car poses as one of their trucks. The cornerstone of all trademark litigation is customer confusion and the resulting dilution of the trademark. To win, Ford needs to make the case that customers are duped into thinking that this Formula 1 car has something to do with a F-150 pickup.
According to Reuters, “Ford is asking the court to bar Ferrari from using the name. The automaker is also seeking unspecified damages, including damages of $100,000 under the Anticybersquatting Consumer Protection Act.”
Fiat owns 85 percent stake in Ferrari. Fiat also is involved with Ford’s crosstown colleagues at Chrysler. According to the complaint, Ford and Ferrari have a “legendary history as rivals in auto racing.”
The cybersquatting stems from a website Ferrari set up: http://www.ferrarif150.com.
There are two defenses against trademark infringement: Fair use and parody. Ferrari will most likely go the fair use route. “The choice of name stems from Ferrari’s desire to pay tribute to this year’s one hundred and fiftieth anniversary of the Unification of Italy,” Ferrari says in a statement on the website. F1 + 150 = F150, capisce?
If that doesn’t work, they can always try parody. “Your honor, our drivers say, it drives like a truck. So we called it F150. Isn’t that funny?”
Bertel Schmitt comes back to journalism after taking a 35 year break in advertising and marketing. He ran and owned advertising agencies in Duesseldorf, Germany, and New York City. Volkswagen A.G. was Bertel's most important corporate account. Schmitt's advertising and marketing career touched many corners of the industry with a special focus on automotive products and services. Since 2004, he lives in Japan and China with his wife <a href="http://www.tomokoandbertel.com"> Tomoko </a>. Bertel Schmitt is a founding board member of the <a href="http://www.offshoresuperseries.com"> Offshore Super Series </a>, an American offshore powerboat racing organization. He is co-owner of the racing team Typhoon.
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FWIW, my guess is that Ford would have let it pass had Ferrari not used a logo that's very close to the F-150 logo. They're nearly identical. Except for the dash, the only difference is that the F has a rounded corner and the 5 has a sharp one in the Ferrari version. Other than that, the letter shapes are pretty much the same, indeed creating the possibility of confusion.
I'm quite sure that if I came out with a car called the Prancing Stallion, and created a logo that used the Ferro Rosso font to spell Stallion, Ferrari's lawyers would be on me like red on a race car. How much the more so if I named the car F-458
F-150? So that's another name for a Ford 1/2-ton?