Date of
Judgment: July 19, 1988
Issuing
Authority: Supreme Court
Level of
the Issuing Authority: Final Instance
Type of
Procedure: Judicial
(Civil)
Subject
Matter: Unfair Competition
Summary
of the judgment (decision):
1. The timing at which
indications, such as a name, trade name, and trademark, for distinguishing a
person's own goods should acquire well-knownness as stipulated in Article 1,
paragraph (1), item (i) of the Unfair Competition Prevention Act is, in relation
to a claim for injunction against the act of creating confusion with the agent
of goods as stipulated in the same item, the time of conclusion of oral
arguments during the fact-finding proceedings in a lawsuit involving a demand
for injunction, and, in relation to a claim for compensation for damages for
the above act, the time when the act, which is the subject of a claim for
compensation for damages, took place.
2. In the case where the
scope of claims for utility model registration is amended after a third party
learns of the content of a device pertaining to a published application for
utility model registration, if the amendment restricts the scope of claims for
utility model registration, and if the article worked by the third party
belongs to the technical scope of the device throughout the period before and
after the amendment, in order for the applicant for utility model registration
to demand against the third party for payment of compensation as stipulated in
Article 13-3, paragraph (1) of the Utility Model Act, it is not necessary for
the third ii party to learn of the content of the amended scope of claims for
the utility model registration by way of repeated warnings or the like by the
applicant of the utility model registration.
(This
translation is provisional and subject to revision.)