MeTL firm loses to rival in tussle over trademark
Dar es Salaam. A MeTL Group subsidiary has lost in a trademark dispute with another company after regulator ruled that it contravened fair competition rules.
Last month, Royal Soap and Detergent Industries Ltd, a subsidiary of MeTL Group, lodged complaints to the Fair Competition Commission (FCC) after its powdered soap branded Mo Cleansoft was seized by another company that claimed trademark infringement.
Keds Tanzania Company Limited, which supplies powdered soap named Kleesoft, impounded 532 bags of Mo Cleansoft in the dispute.
A committee formed by FCC to investigate the matter ruled last week that Kleesoft brand must be protected.
Section 3(1) of the Merchandise and Marks Act restricts a person from possessing, manufacturing, selling, importing/exporting and distributing counterfeit goods. It also restricts applying false trade description of goods.
“The goods seized on November 7, 2019, are in contravention of section 3(1) (c) of the Merchandise Marks Act of 1963,” stated the committee in its ruling signed by its chairman Josephat Mkizungo and the team members.
The mentioned section states that any person, in the course of trade shall not sell, hire out, exchange or offer any counterfeit goods.
The law considers goods as counterfeit if they were produced, packaged or labelled in a manner that makes them appear similar copies of the goods protected by law.
The committee stated that Kleesoft that regardless of slight differences in registration mark and the mark as it appears on the products, “Kleesoft must be protected by both use and registration.”
The trademark was said to have been registered on September 18, 2018 while the disputed Mo Cleansoft started production in June 2019.
According to the ruling, Mo Cleansoft trademark applied for registration since April this year but by the time of hearing it was not yet approved.
The 19-page ruling was delivered on December 16, 2019, according to the document.
“Being in the process of registration does not give them a right to infringe a right of another in the market,” the document stated.
“To a normal person, who is a true tester of the existence of confusion cannot differentiate the two products in the market,” it added.
The committee also upheld the decision to seize the products as issued in a notice by chief inspector of merchandise marks.
MeTL lawyer Catherine Kisasa refused to comment on the decision as she was off-duty yesterday. “I cannot comment anything for today,” she said.
On the other hand, the lawyer of Keds which won in the dispute Mr Lusajo Mwakalundwa said the decision will now accelerate their efforts to seize such products from the markets and take more legal measures to stop their production.
“Since they are counterfeit, they should be destroyed,” he said.
“We are also in the process of filing a case in court to stop production of that soap which was declared counterfeit,” he added.
