American Pfizer Has Recently Failed in Its 9-year-long Lawsuit in China over its Trademark of Viagra

According to the Beijing Youth Daily of 8th April 2008, the American Pfizer Pharmaceuticals Limited has recently be judged to be a loser to a Chinese enterprise by the Beijing Higher People's Court over the Chinese-character trademark ownership of Viagra, and the final judgment rules that Pfizer's requests against a Chinese company can not be upheld and further decides that the Pfizer does not own the trademark ownership of Viagra in mainland China.

In its writs to the Chinese court, Pfizer stated that the trademark related lawsuit started from 1998 when the magic pill of Viagra freshly came into existence, the Cantonese WeiErMan Pharmaceuticals Limited immediately applied to the Chinese trademark authorities for registrations of the Chinese-character trademark of Viagra, resulting in Pfizer unwillingly to register Viagra in China some other Chinese characters of WanAiKe. The Cantonese company not only declared the Chinese-character of Viagra was its own trademark, but also consented other companies to make use of it. Pfizer brought lawsuits to the Chinese court and expected the court to rule that Viagra is a famous trademark unregistered in China, and further rule that the Cantonese company as defendant to compensate Pfizer RMB500,000.

Beijing No.1 Intermediate People's Court of 1st instance tried the case and decided at last to overrule Pfizer's requests, followed by an appeal to the Beijing Higher People's Court by Pfizer.

Beijing Higher People's Court of 2nd instance, after trying the case, believes that according to the independent protection principal for trademarks, Pfizer does not own relevant interests in the trademark of Viagra in mainland China; in additions, verification of famous trademark is beyond the court's jurisdiction. Therefore, the court has recently overruled again the legal requests from Pfizer, ending the 9-year-long trademark lawsuit in China.