Delhi High Court Overturns Order, Grants Injunction to WOW Momo Against ‘WOW BURGER’ Mark

Delhi High Court Backs WOW Momo

The Delhi High Court has intervened in a major legal win to the well-known Indian food chain WOW Momo to defend its brand. An interim injunction was granted in a case by the court by a Division Bench to WOW Momo Foods Private Limited that prevented a Hong Kong-based company to use the name WOW BURGER. This ruling reverses a previous ruling of one judge of the same court, which offers instant reprieve to the popular restaurant chain.

The legal fight was initiated by WOW Momo, which was started in 2008 and currently operates more than 600 stores finding out that another company was willing to enter the Indian market. This newcomer, WOW Burger, was to offer the same fast-food products. WOW Momo went to court at once to prevent them claiming that the new name was an apparent infringement of its trademark rights and that it would dilute into giving customers the impression that the two brands were related.

 the said judge denied the injunction. The rationale of the court was that the term WOW is an English word that is known to be used to show delight. The court decided that WOW is a laudatory word, that is, it was intended to be used to praise and thus, WOW Momo could not have an exclusive monopoly on it.

It is this defeat that had made WOW Momo appeal promptly to a Division Bench, a bench of two judges, within the same High Court. The company claimed that the single judge made a faulty order. They argued that it was not a matter of possession of the word WOW alone, but rather a matter of guarding the special brand name that they had established through the combination of WOW with foodstuff, which was now a special name in the minds of people.

The Appeal and the Reversal

The Division Bench consisting of Justice C Hari Shankar and Justice Om Prakash Shukla had a very different perception of the case. They considered the essence of the law of trademarks, which is to avoid confusion among the consumers. The single judge had an argument that was highly disputed by the bench. According to them, the previous case had not done justice to look into the key aspect of trademark infringement and how consumers perceive brands in the market.

The lawyers of WOW Momo complained that they had developed a family of marks. They had played the WOW prefix as a prominent and recognizable component of their brand by titling their brands with names such as WOW MOMO, WOW DIMSUMS. They argued that any other company that would be employing the format of a WOW + food item such as WOW BURGER would be unfairly replicating their branding concept. This, they argued, would give the wrong impression to the masses that it was a new line of products under WOW Momo.

The Division Bench concurred with this argument all the way. The judges observed that the average consumer who might not recall the name accurately would most probably assume that there was a connection between the two marks. They claimed that it would be natural when a customer would believe that the already existing brand of WOW Momo had just introduced a new brand of the burgers. Their decision was based on such a presumption of association.

The court believed that the single judge emphasizing on whether WOW was unique in itself was not the right thing to do. The actual test as they put it was to compare the two entire marks, WOW MOMO and WOW BURGER as one. On this basis of comparison, the court found them to be misleading when it came to the fact that they were both being used on the same fast-food merchandise.

Why ‘WOW’ is More Than Just a Word

The case decision of the Division Bench was a comprehensive explanation of the reason why the trademark of WOW Momo was unique. The judges indicated that WOW is an exclamation and not an adjective. As such, its application in a name such as “WOW MOMO” is not a literal meaning as a description. Rather, even the notion of blending this exclamation and the name of a foodstuff was a creative notion in itself and, accordingly, unique.

The court said this is the innovative blend that WOW Momo had developed. The name has a message of delivering the message that the food is so good it can make you say wow. According to the judges, it was a direct imitation of this unique idea called WOW BURGER. The court went as far as calling this a case of infringements of ideas, as the respondent had evidently borrowed the creative idea on which WOW Momo had built a successful brand.

The bench made it clear that WOW Momo cannot assert that the standalone word WOW is a protected mark. Nevertheless, that did not undermine their right to defend their registered composite mark, WOW MOMO. The court concluded that indeed the prefix WOW had developed distinctiveness and goodwill due to the large scale usage and popularity used over the years by the company. This was to ensure that it was not used by others in a manner that may create confusion.

Other aspects which the single judge had taken into account including possible variations in the menu or product appearance were also rejected by the court. The Division Bench decided that these factors were completely inapplicable to the issue of infringement of trademarks. They said it was the direct comparison of the marks themselves, and in that test, WOW BURGER was evidently violating the rights of WOW Momo.

A Strong Message on Brand Protection

The high court in Delhi overturned and cancelled the decision of the single judge of September. The Division Bench allowed interim injunction which WOW Momo had initially requested. This injunction prevents WOW Burger and its affiliates to use the mark WOW BURGER, or any other mark confusingly or deceptively similar to the mark WOW MOMO, during the course of the main lawsuit.

This case sends a good signal on the issue of brand protection in the Indian food business that is very competitive. It supports the legal truth that a brand can be constructed through a combination of ordinary words into a distinctive and unusual manner.