Watch out Barney the dinosaur, one-third of Mardi Gras, and whatever the heck McDonalds' "Grimace" actually is: You're officially on notice. A federal court has ruled that AT&T subsidiary and prepaid service provider Aio Wireless has officially infringed on T-Mobile's… color.
Yes, color.
"T-Mobile [U.S. Inc.] is very pleased that the federal court in Texas has ordered Aio Wireless, a subsidiary of AT&T, to stop infringing T-Mobile's magenta trademark. The court agreed with us that Aio can't continue infringing T-Mobile's magenta mark by using large blocks of what it has called 'plum,' and told Aio to stop using magenta or similar colors in all of its marketing and advertising, including stores, web sites and social media," reads a statement from T-Mobile.
"The Court's ruling, coming after extensive argument and a three-day hearing, validates T-Mobile's position that wireless customers identify T-Mobile with magenta and that T-Mobile's use of magenta is protected by trademark law."
Aio Wireless officially launched in May of last year, and it took T-Mobile all of three months before it filed a trademark infringement suit against the service provider in the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of Texas. In the complaint, T-Mobile alleged that AT&T created AIO Wireless "which — out of all of the colors in the universe — chose magenta to begin promoting no-contract wireless communications services in direct competition with T-Mobile."
Not only did Aio Wireless use magenta for its logo, T-Mobile alleged that the company used magenta just about everywhere else as well. That include its marketing materials, advertisements, and even the service provider's giant coverage map — all magenta.
Aio Wireless' response? According to a representative, speaking to The Consumerist when the complaint was first filed: "T-Mobile needs an art lesson. Aio doesn't do magenta."
Not anymore, at least. Federal District Court judge Lee Rosenthal found that the service provider did, in fact, intend to cause confusion by its use of a similar color to T-Mobile's.
"The record is clear that Aio wanted to capture T-Mobile customers. Through consumer-survey analysis and through Aio's own focus-group testing, T-Mobile has presented credible evidence that Aio's use of broad swaths of blocks of Aio plum is likely to, and, at least in some instances, actually did, cause initial-interest confusion," Rosenthal wrote in his ruling.
"The continued use of large blocks of plum is likely to cause irreparable harm to the good will and brand identity that T-Mobile has spent billions of dollars creating since it arrived in the United States."
Consequently, Aio Wireless is now prohibited from using "Pantone 676C" or similar colors as a core part of its business and advertising.
For more, check out PCMag Live in the video below, which discusses T-Mobile's win over Aio Wireless.