Yishijia is suing the two companies for use of the Homevv trademark on Apple (NASDAQ:AAPL)’s App Store. Yishijia owns the trademark and wants approximately $16 million, according to the complaint filed in the Shanghai No. 1 Intermediate People’s Court.
Yishijia applies to upload Homevv app to Apple’s App Store
Shanghai Daily reports that Yishijia applied to upload its mobile app Homevv in April. The app is an online shopping platform. Apple rejected it, however, since Woshang already had an app using the same trademark in its App Store. Yishijia has reportedly owned the Homevv trademark since 2010. The company has repeatedly ask Apple to remove Woshang’s app from the App Store, but Apple refused.
The official court complaint again demands that Apple remove Woshang’s app from the App Store. It also demands that Woshang stop using the Homevv trademark and that both companies issue public apologies. Yoshijia said it has lost clients and market share because of the two companies’ actions.
Apple’s trouble in China
Apple has seen plenty of trouble in China over the last few years. Last year, Shanghai Zhizhen Network Technology Co accused Apple of patent infringement in its Siri digital personal assistant. Zhizhen makes Xiao i Robot, another voice recognition technology. The year before that, Apple faced charges of selling unlicensed e-books written by eight Chinese writers through the App Store. In 2012 Apple also faced a case brought by Proview Technology, which attempted to stop Apple from selling any more iPads in Shanghai. And just this month, the Chinese government-sponsored media said Apple and also Google (NASDAQ:GOOGL) (NASDAQ:GOOG) should be punished for digital spying.
Apple has emphasized that China is an important market for it and had to do damage control for its reputation multiple times. Trouble at the company’s suppliers has also plagued Apple’s reputation in China. Nonetheless, Chinese consumers have shown time and again that they crave the company’s trendy products.
