Bell’s Fibe trademark challenged in Federal Court

SkyChoice Communications, a service provider of television, phone and Internet expert services operating in lots of Canadian provinces, is challenging the use of the Fibe trademark by Bell Canada right before the Federal Courtroom of Canada. The petition argues that the trademark lacks distinctiveness, with a variation of only one letter in between Fibe and fiber, a typically used phrase.

Canadian trademark polices generally prohibit the registration of logos that might be baffled with common words these kinds of as “fiber”, which is increasingly utilised by telecommunications providers globally in the marketing of their Internet expert services. In order to be certain the achievement of the obstacle, SkyChoice has retained the expert services of what it promises to be a single of the most significant regulation companies in the environment.

Since optical fiber is now a crucial offering issue when promoting fast and trusted Web service, registering the initial four letters of the term fiber as a trademark allegedly prevents unbiased Online Assistance Providers (ISPs) from utilizing this frequent word in entire or in part in their brand image.

“Independent ISPs now operate at a competitive disadvantage mostly thanks to restricted or prohibitively priced obtain to incumbent fiber facilities in Canada, one particular of the nations around the world with the maximum prices for World wide web solutions in the world”, states Serge Cormier, chief govt officer of SkyChoice.

In addition, a general public authorized fund has been established with the assistance of Liberty Fibers, an organization focused to expanding world-wide-web affordability in Canada. The organization would like to elevate awareness of the large wholesale accessibility fees levied by incumbents to impartial ISPs for CRTC-mandated wholesale fiber-to-the-home accessibility.