Although Apple's US$3,499 Vision Pro headset received worldwide media attention at the WWDC 2023 last week, there are already companies waiting to take a big bite out of the Vision Pro sales through trademark lawsuits.
Huawei Central pointed out that as early as 2019, Huawei was already successful in obtaining authorization for use of the "Vision Pro" product trademark in China. According to the trademark application, Huawei's Vision Pro trademark's registration number is 38242888, and the company has exclusive rights of trademark use from November November 28, 2021, to November 27, 2031.
Source: CNIPA
The bad news is Huawei is not the only company to have been granted the use of the "Vision Pro" trademark in China. "Actually, there are three companies that have been authorized to use the Vision Pro trademark in the electronic category. "Huawei is just one of them," said Cecilia Liu, a senior intellectual property rights (IPR) management consultant. The other two companies received their trademark approval from the China National Intellectual Property Agency (CNIPA) in 2014 and 2021, respectively.
Source:CNIPA
"Apple Inc. has filed about 1,799 trademark applications in China, but we have not noticed any one of them registered under the name 'Vision Pro'," said Liu, who stressed that it is still possible that Apple has applied for the trademark with the product features, since the product may have very different appearance and function with any of the products with the Vision Pro trademark currently available in China.
However, Apple may still face an ugly trademark fight in China, whose courts are notoriously protective of domestic companies' interests. Apple has been involved in a number of trademark disputes, including an iPad trademark dispute in 2012 (with a settlement of US$60 million) and an iPhone trademark dispute in 2016.
Surprisingly, Apple also faces challenges on its home turf. Murray Equipment Inc. applied for the "VisionPro" (registration no. 7052064) trademark in 2021 and was granted authorization in February 2023.
Source: USPTO
If Apple is determined to use the name "Vision Pro" for its AR/VR headsets, a dogfight for the rights to use the trademark may be inevitable.
