What's in a name? Would an oil services giant doing business as ESSO be as profitable as one using the trademark ExxonMobil?

Currently, Texas-based ExxonMobil is involved in a trademark case in the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Missouri in which the oil services company is seeking to have the court set aside a 78-year-old permanent injunction. U.S. Judge Carol E Jackson is presiding over the case, Exxon Mobil Corp. v. BP.

In Exxon's Memorandum in Support of Motion to Modify Injunction Fed. R. Civ. P. 60(b)(5), the company asks the court to modify the 1937 decree that permanently enjoined Esso Inc. from using the mark ESSO in the marketing of petroleum products in fifteen states.