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| TITLE | 【Syllabus of Latest Opinion】 Supreme Court Decision 2023Hu10118 Decided June 5, 2026 【Confirmation of the Scope of Rights (Trademark)】 [full Text] |
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| Summary | |
| 【Main Issues and Holdings】 [1] Standard of determining whether trademarks are similar [2] Method of determining whether combined trademarks that consist of a combination of two or more letters or figures are similar (held: the “principle of overall observation”) When there exist “dominant parts” among the constituent parts of the trademarks, the method of determining whether the trademarks are similar (held: the “comparison of dominant parts”) Matters to be considered when determining which constituent part of a trademark is the dominant part and the method of determining the similarity of trademarks where there are two or more dominant parts in the compared trademarks. [3] In a case where when Party A, a user of “ ,” the mark of a trademark subject to confirmation, which is used on beverage products, requested a passive trial to confirm the scope of rights against Party B, a foreign company and the holder of “ ,” the registered trademark whose designated goods include energy drinks, arguing that the trademark subject to confirmation do not belong to the scope of rights of the registered trademark and the Korean Intellectual Property Tribunal made a trial decision to dismiss the request, Party A request the court to revoke the trial decision, the case holding that as the ‘ ’ part, the dominant part of the registered trademark, and the ‘ ’ part and the ‘ ’ part, the dominant parts of the trademark subject to confirmation, have significant differences in their appearances, pronunciations, and concepts, they are not similar to each other, and thus, the trademark subject to confirmation does not fall within the scope of rights of the registered trademark | |
