Did Huawei plagiarize the Chanel logo? The European Union court ruled on Wednesday 21 April that Chanel's case against the Chinese computer company was not a good one. Chanel accused Huawei of having registered a logo too similar to its own. This is the second setback for the French luxury brand, which had already seen its complaint rejected in 2019 by the European Union Intellectual Property Office. Since 2017, Chanel has been trying to ban Huawei's logo.
Logo registered by Huawei in 2017
Importance of the horizontal or vertical direction of the logo
The European Court of Justice declared that the trademarks must be compared as they were filed and registered without any change in their orientation.
"The conflicting brands have some similarities but their visual differences are significant. In particular, Chanel's features have more rounded curves, thicker lines, and a horizontal orientation, when the Huawei brand's orientation is vertical." the court said.
It is thus understood that despite the strong similarity between the two logos - each of the logos represents two arcs of circle which intersect - the fact that one is turned vertically when the other is turned horizontally prevents from concluding to plagiarism.
For the moment, Chanel has not commented on the decision of the European Union court. However, it can still file an appeal before the European Court of Justice.
Note that the official logo of the Chinese company founded in 1987 is a pattern reminiscent of the petals of a flower (Huawei in Chinese means flower).
