The creation of a new tribunal will give companies an extra tool to protect their business' reputation. The Company Names Tribunal came into existence on 1 October 2008 and has the power to deal with opportunistic company name registrations.
Until now a brand owner had no way of complaining about someone else with the same or similar registered company name trading off the back of their reputation. Instead they would have had to take legal action on the basis of "passing off" (where, for instance, it could reasonably be thought by a customer that theproducts/services offered by the 'pretender' brand were actually those of the 'genuine' brand) and/or trademark infringement.
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