McCurry

I have just come across this page to find that McDonalds have lost an 8 year old battle to dispute their claims over the patent 'McDonalds'. Well, my first thought would be, 'yeah, served McDonalds right'. On the other hand, I do feel that there is more into this than just who won or lost the case.

As we know, McDonalds is a corporate company and they have registered their business name with governments of the world. This is to disallow other companies to come up with similar business names as to violate their established business in the market. That is why we have Trademark law and so on. This is to protect businesses from being violated by other people. I have to say that such legislations are important for the survival of a company especially in difficult times.

McCurry owners claimed that their business is different from McDonalds. They are in a food business and had set up their business as 'McCurry'. It is a short form for 'Malaysian Chicken Curry'. Whilst the 'McCurry' owners managed to have the last laugh when the Federal Court dismissed an appeal by the lawyers for the food giant, I feel sad in a way as to see that Malaysia does not have good Trademark legislations.

I am not criticising the Malaysian legislations but I am saying that there should be tougher legislations in protecting one's trademark. It is a business and so it concerns a person's livelyhood. Just think about it if the situation will change if McDonalds is a small company and McCurry is a big company instead. In Malaysia, you can see electrical products like 'Panasonic' and 'Pensonic' selling side by side. Don't you think that there is some trademark infringment over here? What makes you think Panasonic have not decided to take up an action against the company called 'Pensonic'?

I feel quite cross and sad but it is how things are done over there. How sad but true... With this ruling, it will mean that other companies in Malaysia will be able to use 'Mc'.