Research in Motion is gearing up to defend the name of its popular instant messaging service, BlackBerry Messenger, or BBM.
Toronto-based BBM Canada, an industry group of broadcasters, advertisers and agencies, is preparing for a Jan. 11 hearing in a Toronto courtroom after filing a lawsuit against RIM last year that alleged trademark infringement, the Globe and Mail reported last week.
But BBM Canada would be willing to change its name for a price, according to Reuters. "We have to be practical, they operate worldwide, we don't," BBM Canada President and CEO Jim MacLeod told the news service.
The BlackBerry supplier of smartphones and tablet computers must defend BBM – a service that has 50 million users around the world – after recently capitulating in a trademark infringement action filed by Basis International, a software company that sued RIM over the name BBX. Earlier this month, RIM renamed its next-generation mobile platform to BlackBerry 10 after a federal judge granted Basis International a temporary restraining order that prohibited RIM from using the BBX name at a conference in Asia.
BBM Canada has used BBM in its logo for more than six decades and owns the trademarks in Canada and the United States, according to the Globe and Mail. MacLeod told Reuters that his company contacted RIM after the BlackBerry maker introduced a big BBM advertising campaign. Those efforts apparently didn't persuade RIM to stop using the BBM name or reach an agreement with BBM Canada.
RIM appears willing to fight BBM Canada in court where it must defend itself against a request for damages and an injunction that would prevent RIM and its employees from using the BBM name.
"We believe that BBM Canada is attempting to obtain trademark protection for the BBM acronym that is well beyond the narrow range of the services it provides and well beyond the scope of rights afforded by Canadian trademark law," RIM told Reuters in an emailed statement.
