The Muslim dating app Muzz, previously named Muzmatch, has lost its appeal against Tinder owner Match Group after it was told to change its name.
The Court of Appeal upheld a June 2022 ruling that the average consumer would have thought Muzmatch was part of Match Group.
Cassandra Hill, Partner and Head of Mishcon de Reya's Intellectual Property Enforcement Group, spoke with World Intellectual Property Review to analyse the ruling.
She commented: "The Court of Appeal held that… Muzmatch did not demonstrate that the relevant class of consumers had come to understand that Match's trade marks and Muzmatch's sign denoted different trade origins. They would assume that they were related despite almost no confusion between the trade marks and signs having been detected. Simply because two businesses have been operating in the same market for some time and despite there being little to no confusion between the two, if one is taking unfair advantage of the other's trade marks and consumers believe there is a link between them, they will potentially be found to be infringing."
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