Inter are moving closer to trademarking ‘Inter’ after the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office threw out one of Major League Soccer’s arguments against it according to a report from Law.com.
Back in 2014 Inter filed a trademark application for the term ‘Inter’ so they can have exclusive commercial rights and MLS, the league now home to David Beckham’s franchise Inter Miami, filed an opposition to Inter’s trademark application in March 2019.
Inter have attempted to trademark ‘Inter’ as they believe the term has become synonymous with themselves but MLS contend that the term Inter is one, merely descriptive, and two, likely to cause confusion.
Inter filed a motion to dismiss the second claim and the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office agreed to dismiss MLS’ second point on the basis that there are several other clubs whose names contain ‘Inter’ in it such as Internacional (Brazil), FC Inter Turku (Finland), NK Inter Zapresic (Croatia) among others.
MLS have appealed against this decision but it is likely to be dismissed again.
