CURRENT LEGAL PROBLEMS LECTURE SERIES 2011-12: 

The Role of Legitimacy in Trade Mark Law

by
Dr Ilanah Simon-Fhima
UCL Faculty of Laws

Chaired by The Rt Hon Mr Justice Floyd

on 3 November 2011, from 6-7pm

Venue:
UCL Law Faculty
Bentham House, Endsleigh Gardens
London WC1H 0EG

Accredited with 1 CPD hour by the
Solicitors Regulation Authority, the Bar Standards Board, and IPReg 

About this lecture:
Far from being a ‘monopoly right’, the rights granted under a trade mark equate to the exclusive right to undertake a number of activities, and to prevent others from doing the same. However, even within the scope of those exclusive rights, the Court of Justice of the European Union has attempted to demarcate between permitted and non-permitted uses of those legislatively granted exclusive rights using the tool of ‘legitimacy’.

This lecture attempts to map out the instances in which the concept of legitimacy has been used in trade mark law, and to determine when the CJEU does and does not consider a trade mark owner’s reliance on its rights to be ‘legitimate’. The lecture will also take a wider look at how legitimacy is understood in other areas of law and theory, comparing this to the CJEU’s approach in its trade mark jurisprudence.
 

About the speaker: 
Ilanah Simon Fhima is a lecturer and co-director of the Institute of Brand and Innovation Law at UCL Faculty of Laws. Her particular research interest is in European and comparative trade mark law, with a focus on the scope of protection. She has published extensively on both European and US trade mark law on both sides of the Atlantic. Her book on European and US trade mark dilution will be published in November 2011 by Oxford University Press.