THE Supreme People’s Court (SPC) on Thursday issued a ruling that favored part of the claims lodged by U.S. basketball icon Michael Jordan against a Chinese firm and the trademark authority.

    The court ruled that the trademark in dispute, “乔丹,” the Chinese translation for Jordan, violated Jordan’s right to his name and broke provisions in the Trademark Law.

    The registration of the “乔丹” trademark will also be revoked.

    The court also ruled that Jordan has no exclusive rights to the use of the alphabetic spelling of “Qiaodan,” which is the pinyin (phonetic spelling) of the Chinese characters, and rejected his claims in this regard.

    The top court in April publicly tried the trademark dispute case filed by Jordan.

    In 2012, Jordan accused the Fujian-based Qiaodan Sports Co. Ltd., which operates about 6,000 shops selling shoes and sportswear throughout China, of unauthorized use of his name and identity.

    Jordan lodged an appeal to the State trademark authority to revoke the trademark in dispute, but this was rejected.

    Later, Jordan filed lawsuits against the adjudication of the trademark authority but lost.

    Chinese courts originally upheld the adjudication on the grounds that the Chinese translation “乔丹” is the translation of a common family name, and does not necessarily refer to the basketballer’s name only.

    In 2015, Jordan appealed to the SPC.

    Jordan said in a statement that millions of Chinese fans and consumers had always known him by the name 乔丹 and that he was happy the court had recognized his right to protect his name.

    “Chinese consumers deserve to know that Qiaodan Sports and its products have no connection to me. Nothing is more important than protecting your own name, and today’s decision shows the importance of that principle,” Jordan said.

    (Xinhua)

    Chinese law protects foreign companies in cases where their brand was already famous in China before being registered by a Chinese firm seeking to capitalize on its notoriety.

    （Xinhua）