for sale

Archive for the ‘directory’ Category

Yellow Pages unprotected
The Trademark Office has deleted the telecoms mark from the register. Others want to advertise using the name

Berlin – The German Telekom is known for having defended their name, their brands and their color with all legal means. Now she has again lost a fight: GoYellow CEO Klaus Harish, who runs a business directory on the web, had the Patent and Trademark Office in Munich is requesting the deletion of the brand “Yellow Pages”. After two years the Office has also been “yellow pages” and “Yellow Pages” now erased from its register. The Telekom will not accept this decision, preferring the Federal Patent Court. Because it is a lucrative market.

The Trademark Office justified the decision on the fact that the term had become yellow pages consumers in effect, a synonym for business directories, so that other companies may use that name.

Finally, the office had to delete the tag lottery and mail. The deletion of the Yellow Pages brand, but is only valid if the Federal Patent Court sees it that way. As long as the brand is protected.

Harish Klaus has spent up to this decision is already four million euros for the approximately 40 cases in which he has led in the past two years with Telekom. “The clashes with Telekom are very expensive in the long run,” said Harish told the Tagesspiegel. He occupied three outside law firms with it. “A lot of care if the name Yellow Pages is no longer protected.” So had the Telekom at prohibiting, among other things, for its business information with the sayings, “the new Yellow Pages,” “the modern Yellow Pages or the new yellow times to advertise. ” The share price of GoYellow AG presented on Monday temporarily by 27 percent.

“For the German Telekom is a great loss, as the term is introduced,” said Christopher Scholz, Managing Director says the brand association. “If every Tom, Dick and Kunz allowed to offer the product as yellow pages, Telekom loses an important communications monopoly.” Quantify the loss in money could be difficult. He often borne out by later, but the loss of market share.

The Yellow Pages are a lucrative business. The Deutsche Telekom subsidiary bis buys about 30 million records from the telecom and markets – albeit together with 16 publishers that have the federal territory shared between them. 2005 bis Telekom AG had a profit of 114 million euros – with an estimated turnover of 350 million €. A few years DeTeMedien was once for sale, but the telecoms did not get the desired billion. Competitor France Telecom is negotiating with the U.S. private equity firm KKR, which wants to acquire the French Yellow Pages for 3.3 billion euros. But so much was not worth the German counterpart, say insiders. That is because the market run on the regional publishers.