On May 9th, according to domestic media reports, the Guangzhou Intellectual Property Court recently ruled on the second instance of YY Live's lawsuit against "YaYa Live" and "YaYa Live" for trademark infringement.
The appeal by Guangzhou Jiujun Information Technology Co., Ltd. and 5 other companies was rejected, upholding the original judgment of the first instance, determining that "YaYa Live" and "YaYa Live" infringed on YY Live's trademark rights. Jiujun and the other 5 companies were ordered to pay a punitive compensation of 3 million RMB and bear all the costs of the second instance.
It is reported that in September 2019, YY Live discovered an app called "YY Live" in the app market. Subsequently, they complained through official channels to have the infringing software taken down.
However, in 2021, YY Live once again found that "YY Live" had been renamed to "Ya Ya Live" and was relaunched on multiple platforms, using inappropriate comparisons to YY Live such as "more exciting than YY Live" in the app description.
YY Live then filed a lawsuit against this with the Tianhe District Court in Guangzhou.
The court believes that YY Live and Ya Ya Live constitute similar trademarks. Although "Ya Ya" is in Chinese, both it and the letters "YY" have a forked tree branch-like shape, visually very similar, easily leading the relevant public to mistakenly believe the source of the service, constituting a similar trademark.
In addition, nine companies, including Jiujun, operate multiple live streaming platforms such as "Ya Ya Live" and "Aa Live," directing traffic to the "Mito Live" platform. This platform has been cited as a typical case, involving vulgar content in online performances and receiving administrative penalties.
