Our team marked the end of the year with another successful case, this time in the field of unfair competition.
Our client is a company that provides coaching and beauty industry services aimed at developing and supporting modern women. As the company’s management discovered, a new player had appeared on the market in the same region and had begun to actively promote the services of its beauty salon under an almost identical name.
The competitor’s brand was so similar to our client’s trademark and commerce name that consumers began to confuse the salons. Despite our claim demanding that they cease using someone else’s commercial name and registered trademark, the competitor only slightly changed the spelling of the name (replacing one letter in one of the words) and, moreover, applied to register this name as their own trademark.
Realising that the situation could quickly escalate into the consolidation of a similar competitor’s brand on the market, we developed a comprehensive strategy combining intellectual property rights protection and unfair competition defence tools.
In particular, our lawyers:
- Filed objections with the Ukrainian National Office of Intellectual Property and Innovations (UANIPIO) against the registration of a sign that was confusingly similar to the client’s already registered trademark;
- Initiated proceedings in the territorial branch of the Antimonopoly Committee of Ukraine on the grounds of unfair competition, namely, the unlawful use of signs without the consent of their original user.
Thanks to our consistent actions, in the summer and autumn of 2025, our client achieved positive results on two levels:
- Based on the results of the examination, UANIPIO decided to refuse to register the competitor’s trademark in relation to all the services claimed;
- The Antimonopoly Committee recognised the competitor’s actions as unfair competition and imposed a fine of UAH 68,000.
After the fine was paid, the decision came into force and the case was closed without further appeal.
The case shows that the combination of legal mechanisms for protecting intellectual property rights and combating unfair competition not only stops violations but also effectively restores justice in the market.