Apple Loses, Amazon to Maintain Usage of 'App Store' Term

Apple's injunction prohibiting Amazon's using of the term "App Store" was denied by a federal judge in a US District Court for Northern California.

Judge Phyllis Hamilton ruled that the usage of the words "App Store" was unlikely to cause confusion among consumers over which App Store belonged to which company and declared:

"The court finds that Apple has not established a likelihood of success on its dilution claim. First, Apple has not established that its 'App Store' mark is famous, in the sense of being 'prominent' and 'renowned.' The evidence does show that Apple has spent a great deal of money on advertising and publicity, and has sold/provided/furnished a large number of apps from its AppStore, and the evidence also reflects actual recognition of the 'App Store' mark. However, there is also evidence that the term 'app store' is used by other companies as a descriptive term for a place to obtain software applications for mobile devices."

Thus, Amazon retained the right to continue using the term although the court also ruled against Amazon's claimed of the 'App Store' being generic.

Although Amazon does not sell mobile apps for Apple but for the Android platform, Apple alleged that the use of the term by its counterpart was confusing and misleading its customers.

Apple has been trying to own the term "App Store" legally in the U.S. and filed a lawsuit in March against Amazon claiming that the online retailer was infringing its trademarks rights.

The company known for its great gadgets and the iPhone, said yesterday that although the injunction was not granted, it would still continue the case.