Landmark ruling obtained in favour of Jaguar

Jaguar Land Rover has been successful in the Chinese courts at preventing a Chinese copycat from selling its version of the Land Rover Evoque model, ending a three-year court battle. The Beijing Chaoyang District Court ruled that Jiangling Motor Corporation's ("JMC") Landwind X7 model had five specific features that were directly copied from the Evoque model which caused confusion between consumers.

In 2016, the UK based car manufacturer sued JMC over its Landwind X7 sport utility vehicle, which Jaguar Land Rover claimed had an extreme resemblance to its Evoque model. The Landwind model however, was being sold for £26,000 less than Land Rovers model.

The court ordered that all sales, manufacturing and marketing of the Landwind vehicle must cease immediately and ordered compensation to Jaguar.

The ruling has been described as the first of its kind in the industry. Chinese car firms have long been making cheap replicas of models made by western car manufacturers, so the ruling is a significant step in the right direction towards stopping this pattern.

The ruling is not only a win for western car firms but incites a higher level of confidence that the Chinese courts are adjudicating intellectual property cases fairly and justly. We have previously reported on the Chinese theft of intellectual property here and here.

If you have any questions on the above, please do not hesitate to contact the team at McDaniel & Co. on 0191 281 4000 or legal@mcdanielslaw.com