And now Asus is joining the fray of companies being sued in the courts due infringement of rights. In this case, Asus is being sued by Hasbro, creator of the Tranformers toy robots.
According to reports, the toy giant has had enough of Asus using their names in products. The company’s latest tablet, the Transformer Prime, was the last straw for Hasbro.
Though Habro didn’t act violently when the first Transformer tab was released, but now they think that Asus has infringed their right to use of one of their most popular character names by naming their device close to Optimus Prime. A case was filed against Asus in the Los Angeles Federal Court sometime last week seeking temporary injunction, along with damages.
In a letter written to PaidContent, Hasbro expressed their thought on this issue:
Hasbro continues to aggresively protect its brands and products and the specific actions we are taking today against Asus underscores yet again Hasbro’s willingness to pursue companies who misappropriate our intellectual property for their own financial gain.
Under current trademark law, since tablets and toys do not fall under one category, the case filed against Asus would be invalid. However, Hasbro is asserting that the brand (Transfomers) is expanding and they have the right to protect names associated with their products.
So we’ll have to see how this case develops. 🙂
Image Credit: AndroSym
