Brand is the foundation of an enterprise and the "gold and silver mountain" of an enterprise, but malicious trademark registration and trademark infringement have a great impact on the normal operation of an enterprise. How to strengthen brand protection in the development process of private enterprises?The brand dispute between Good Doctor and Ping An Good Doctor, which began in 2014, has brought us inspiration on the 8-year road of protecting the rights of Good Doctor.
Good Doctor Group is a pharmaceutical and health enterprise that started from Daliangshan, Sichuan, from starting a business with the brand name "Canonda" in 1986 to applying for and being approved to register the "Good Doctor" brand in 1998 according to law, and now it has developed into a national high-tech enterprise, a national intellectual property demonstration enterprise, and a national intellectual property management system certification enterprise with 37 wholly-owned subsidiaries, 14 GMP pharmaceutical factories, national postdoctoral research workers and provincial academician (expert) workstations. "Top 100 Chinese Pharmaceutical Industry", "Top 100 Chinese Private Corporate Social Responsibility" and "Top 100 Private Enterprises in Sichuan". In 2010, "Good Doctor" was recognized as "China Famous Trademark". In recent years, the trademark "Good Doctor" has been registered in Madrid and Africa, and is protected by trademarks in more than 30 countries, including the United States, Japan and Germany.
However, since 2014, Ping An Group has successively applied for the word trademarks "Ping An Doctor", "Ping An Good Doctor", "Ping An Good Doctor", "Good Doctor is Coming" and "Ping An Good Doctor" to infringe on the trademark rights and interests of the "Good Doctor" brand. Since 2018, a total of 42 judgments and rulings have been rendered by the Chengdu Intermediate People's Court, the Liangshan Prefecture Intermediate People's Court, the Sichuan Provincial High People's Court, the Beijing Intellectual Property Court, the Beijing High People's Court and the State Intellectual Property Office, unanimously confirming the infringement of "Ping An Good Doctor", and the Good Doctor Group won all the lawsuits.
On January 15, 2020, Ping An Health Company compensated Good Doctor Group 3 million yuan according to the effective judgment of the courtOn May 12, 2020, Ping An Health published an apology statement in China Consumer Daily in accordance with the effective judgment of the courtIn 2021, under the compulsory enforcement of the Chengdu Intermediate People's Court, Ping An Good Doctor APP was renamed.
Looking back on the 8-year brand dispute between Good Doctor and Ping An Good Doctor, it is not so much a contest between Good Doctor Group and Ping An Group, but a contest between China's judicial power and capital power. For a company that started from scratch in Liangshan Prefecture, Sichuan, and did business, the Good Doctor Group was able to dare to "show its sword" and make the world's top 500 enterprises fail repeatedly, relying on the great progress of China's rule of law construction. Over the past 8 years, the legal workers involved, the fair and strict judges at all levels, and the Chinese judiciary represented by the 42 effective judgments have been the biggest support for the Good Doctor brand. Therefore, although the Good Doctor Group has been mired in the quagmire of rights protection for 8 years, it has been able to engage in R&D, production, and insurance without distraction, increasing the valuation of Good Doctor from 31.6 billion yuan in 2018 to 43.9 billion yuan in 2023, and sparing no effort to cooperate with all levels of "anti-epidemic" during the new crown epidemic. The successful defense of the rights of good doctors fully reflects the fairness of China's judiciary.
The private economy is a new force in promoting Chinese-style modernization, and an important force in promoting China's comprehensive construction of a modern socialist country and the realization of the second centenary goal.
Brand is the foundation of an enterprise, and the road of brand protection is the road of economic development. In order to achieve high-quality development of China's economy, it is necessary to unswervingly follow the path of brand protection, not only at the judicial and administrative levels, but also at the entire society to create an atmosphere of brand protection, and have zero tolerance for infringing on brand rights and interests and destroying the brand development ecology.
At present, China is promoting scientific legislation, strict law enforcement, fair justice and law-abiding in the field of intellectual property rights as a whole, and the whole process of promoting the legal authorization, legal authorization, and lawful use of rights in the field of intellectual property rights.
*: Sichuan Economic Net.