A court has ruled that AT&T's no-contract subsidiary and prepaid service Aio Wireless cannot use the magenta color as it is currently used by T-Mobile in its logo.
AT&T started Aio Wireless in May 2013 and in August 2013, T-Mobile filed a case against Aio Wireless for infringing on its magenta trademark. T-Mobile filed a trademark infringement suit in the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of Texas and alleged that Aio Wireless chose magenta out of so many other available colors to promote no-contract wireless communications services in direct competition with T-Mobile.
T-Mobile complained that Aio Wireless used magenta color not just on its logo but other things as well including advertisements, marketing materials as well as on the carrier's giant coverage map.
T-Mobile has now emerged victorious as federal judge Lee Rosenthal has ruled that there is a "substantial likelihood" that the plum color (Pantone 676C) used by Aio Wireless in its advertising may be confused with the Pantone Process Magenta color used by T-Mobile in its advertising. Judge Rosenthal also said that T-Mobile may suffer irreparable injury if an injunction is not issued. The judge has ordered Aio Wireless to stop stop using "large blocks or swaths" of Pantone 676C or a similar shade in promotional documents, advertising and stores.
"The record is clear that Aio wanted to capture T-Mobile customers. Through consumer-survey analysis and through Aio's own focus-group testing, T-Mobile has presented credible evidence that Aio's use of broad swaths of blocks of Aio plum is likely to, and, at least in some instances, actually did, cause initial-interest confusion," notes Rosenthal in his ruling.
It seems that T-Mobile is satisfied with the court's ruling as the company has also issued a statement on its website confirming the same.
"A federal court has halted AT&T's transparent effort to infringe on T-Mobile's distinctive magenta trademark. T-Mobile [U.S. Inc.] is very pleased that the federal court in Texas has ordered Aio Wireless, a subsidiary of AT&T, to stop infringing T-Mobile's magenta trademark. The Court's ruling, coming after extensive argument and a three-day hearing, validates T-Mobile's position that wireless customers identify T-Mobile with magenta and that T-Mobile's use of magenta is protected by trademark law," says the T-Mobile statement.
The ruling means Aio Wireless will have to take down all its promotional and advertising material that uses Pantone 676C color.
