CHINA’S SUPREME COURT has ruled in favour of basketball legend Michael Jordan in a long-running trademark dispute, ending an eight-year legal battle with Chinese sportswear firm Qiaodan Sports.
The landmark ruling, made late last month, prohibits the Fujian-based company from using the Chinese translation of Jordan’s name, Qiao Dan, AFP reports.
The retired Chicago Bulls player and six-time NBA championship winner has a huge following in basketball-crazy China.
The Supreme Court decision overturns two previous verdicts in favour of the Chinese firm, the French newswire further reports.
However, the Supreme Court still allows the firm to continue using its logo of a silhouetted basketball player – which has similarities with the “Jumpman” logo used by Nike to promote its “Air Jordan” line of sports shoes. On that matter, China’s apex court Court referred the case for retrial by the State Intellectual Property Office.
In 2016, Jordan won the right to his name in Chinese characters, but the Supreme Court upheld the firm’s right to use its trademark “Qiaodan” in Romanised English.
Qiaodan Sports said in a Weibo statement Tuesday that the ruling “would not impact the normal use of [its] existing trademarks, nor would it affect normal business operations.”
Founded in 2000, the sportswear franchise operates more than 5,700 stores across China.
It has also applied for nearly 200 similarly named trademarks including different Chinese spellings of “Qiaodan”, “Flying Power” and “Qiaodan King”, according to the verdict.
