Specsavers v Asda - UK court focuses on Asda's unfair advantage taking (but provides no clear view on how to establish trade mark infringement by dilution)

Specsavers has successfully established that Asda infringed its community trade mark for the word "SPECSAVERS" by Asda's use of the tag line "Be a real spec saver at Asda" during its 2009 campaign to promote its in-store opticians.

The judge held that although use of this tagline did not lead to a likelihood of consumer confusion, Asda did obtain an advantage from the reference it made to the Specsavers mark. The evidence showed that Asda's reference to the Specsavers mark was intentional and so the advantage was held to be unfair. Accordingly, trade mark infringement was established under Article 9(1)(c) of the Community Trade Mark Regulation but not under Article 9(1)(b).

Our expert has produced an indepth analysis of this significant judgment.