The Kit Kat bar is an international sensation, and as a result, Nestle has been trying to protect the candy bar’s shape throughout Europe. A trademark application for its appearance was filed with the European Union Intellectual Property Office (EUIPO) in 2002, and a trademark registration was granted in 2006, but earlier this year, the EU’s General Court declared the registration invalid.
Kvikk Lunsj, a candy bar manufactured in Europe, looks nearly identical to a Kit Kat bar. It features four long portions of candy, each resembling a stretched out pyramid, with the top of each portion chopped off (the mathematical term for this shape is a pyramidal frustum). When Nestle received the European trademark registration for the shape of the Kit Kat bar, Kvikk Lunsj’s then owner, Cadbury, began a court battle to invalidate the registration, and Mondelez (which acquired Cadbury) has continued the fight to this day. Earlier this year, the European Court of Justice ruled that the European trademark registration for the shape of the Kit Kat bar was invalid. Their reasoning? Nestle had not proven that the shape of a Kit Kat bar was distinctive throughout the entire European Union; it had never been proven that a Kit Kat bar could be recognized by its shape in Belgium, Ireland, Greece and Portugal. The case will now go back to the EU Board of Appeal for further review.
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