‘Candy Crush Saga’ developer abandons trademark mission

Recently, we talked about King.com Limited's plan to protect the term "candy" in the United States, but pressure from CandySwipe made it difficult for the "Candy Crush Saga" game to continue with its application to the United States Patent and Trademark Office, Fast Company reported.

The problem at hand is that CandySwipe, a mobile device game that has been around for more than two years already holds the trademark to "Candy Crusher," which sounds extremely familiar to the King.com Limited video game.

When Candy Crush developers said that they would aggressively try to own the term "candy" in the video game world, Fast Company contributor Alice Truong wrote that many "independent developers have built hundreds of games with the word candy in the title, which are hosted on the site Candy Jam." On top of that, many CandySwipe fans began giving five-star ratings to the application on Google Play.

In response to the public outcry against the business, King decided to drop the February 6, 2013 application in the United States. However, they plan on keeping the "Candy" trademark in the European Union.

"We feel that having the rights to Candy Crusher is the best option for protecting Candy Crush in the U.S. market," King.com Limited's statement reads. "This does not affect our E.U. trademark for Candy and we continue to take all appropriate steps to protect our [intellectual property]."

Startups that are looking to protect its trade secrets from potential competitors may find themselves with a lot backlash. This situation can be avoided if inventors were aware of what types of patents or trademarks have been filed to the USPTO. Small business attorneys can help identify a strategy that works with any organization's plans for entering the free market. 

Categorised in: Intellectual Property Law

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