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A Made in Italy affair that spread all over the world
The story dates back to 2012 when Vincenzo and Giacomo from Arzano, 9 kilometers north of Naples – Italy – decided to register their own trademark for a new fashion company. Nothing strange as many companies around the world create and register trademarks every day but that time something bizarre happened as the registered trademark was a name: “Steve Jobs”.
Moreover they also created a logo, a bitten “J” to represent their fashion accessories and clothing throughout the world but someone found faults about that: do you figure out whom are we speaking about?
The Italian brothers who defeated Apple: Love & Hate
It’s not a joke and if you are thinking of registering a trademark as Bill Gates or Zuckenberg well it’s not so easy at all.
The Italian brothers Vincenzo and Giacomo Barbato are not two inexperienced guys who wanted to try their luck with a great idea to make money with a well known name. They are clever or uncretive – as Mike Destefano has written on Complex.com – businessmen who realized that. Apple had not registered Steve Jobs’ name as a trademark so they did it adding a bitten J as a well recognizable logo and a five-year-long battle against Cupertino started.
How did the Steve Jobs company win?
A letter is not a fruit. That makes sense and as a result of such an obvious observation a “J” is not an Apple and if we can bite an Apple it’s not possible to bite a letter. Million of dollars and a five – years – trial arrived at such a conclusion. Law can be really disarming sometimes. Did Vincenzo and Giacomo know the difference between a fruit and a letter? Yes of course as they based the creation of their logo and the registration of Steve Job’s name on such a simple fact. Apple tried to remove Steve Jobs’ name and the relating logo from their fashion company but at the end the European Union Intellectual Property Office’s decision was unappellable: they have the right to use their logo and Steve Jobs’ name to promote their company and their products.
What are Steve Jobs’ company future projects?
They started as a fashion company with their not edible logo producing accessories and clothing. However as the two Italian brothers revealed in an interview Steve Jobs trademark was registered to promote high tech products using the iPhone creator’s name as a magnet to draw new investors into their business. New innovative electronic devices could be the future products for Vincenzo and Giacomo: high quality devices that would reflect Steve Jobs’ dreams about future and technology. However can you imagine an Android smartphone Steve Jobs branded? Someone in Cupertino won’t sleep very well at all for the next year.
What about American press on the Italian affair?
The battle between Steve Jobs and Apple was a good news for American press for two good reasons. First of all Made in Italy is well known in USA and speaking about an Italian fashion company is common especially if they are accompanied by rumors. The second one regards a deeper human attitude that dates back to the Bible and continues on actual time:a giant against a little one. The small Italian company that defeats a high tech giant as Apple – The Verge – is something that people like. USA Today too gave a great emphasis to such a news underling not only the Italian brothers’ ambitions in the fashion business but also their future projects for high tech devices as their brand was “born absolutely for electronics” – Vincenzo and Giacomo said. However if someone speaks about them as clever and smart businessmen there are actually some doubts about the inexplicable decision of the European Court referring to that as a bizarre European ruling as written by Ben Lovejoy on 9TO5Mac.com.
