The Western Cape High Court of South Africa held that Pepkor Retail Limited, a local retailer dealing with similar line of products, has not infringed or passed off his goods as that of the leading sports brand Adidas. Judge Allie made few remarks in the course of the judgement which suggested that there was no infringement by the defendants. Firstly she said that the stripes in the mark of Pepkor wither had 2 or four stripes but not 3 like Adidas does. Further, the stripes weren’t placed at equal intervals and had a two plus two spacing.
Adidas claims that the lines are laterally placed and that by itself makes it deceptively similar to their brand amounting to infringing. Inspite of the arguments put forth by the plaintiffs in the case, Judge Allie is of the opinion that they aren’t identical or nearly resembling to confuse the consumer. Another interesting point she made was that an average South African wanting to purchase shoes wasn’t likely to notice whether the trademark on the shoe had three stripes or four! Thus the application was dismissed with costs.
Author: Nikitha Hemmige
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