Pleading Storm: Louis Vuitton Suing BELLE International Plagiarism Brand Archlight Sneakers

According to the South China Morning Post, French luxury brand Louis Vuitton is suing the two subsidiary companies of Belle International Holdings Ltd (hereinafter referred to as BELLE International), claiming that its products infringed the copyright of Louis Vuitton Archlight sneakers.

A document disclosed by the Hongkong High Court on May 3rd showed that Louis Vuitton said BELLE international and Lizhong Shoes Co., Ltd. (hereinafter referred to as Li Zhong shoes industry) began selling a brand of Archlignt brand shoes from 2018 to spring and summer series from July 2018.

The price of the sneakers in the mainland of China is 8150 yuan.

Louis Vuitton said that Archlignt sneakers have gained wide popularity in China and the global market. Consumers will naturally associate the design of this shoe with the Louis Vuitton brand, while BELLE international and Lizhong shoes industries have plagiarized Archlignt shoes and sold them without authorization.

In addition, Louis Vuitton also said Archlignt sneakers enjoy a good reputation all over the world. BELLE's international low quality imitations will damage the reputation of Louis Vuitton brand.

According to the court documents, Louis Vuitton is applying for a prohibition order, requiring immediate and permanent prohibition of the sale of suspected plagiarized footwear products by BELLE international and Lizhong shoes industry, and further requests for economic compensation.

BELLE international listed on the Hongkong stock exchange in 2007. It owns Belle BELLE, Teenmix Teenmix, Staccato Staccato and other brands. It also acts as a shoe distributor for Nike, Adidas, Adidas, and other sports brands.

In July 27, 2017, BELLE International announced the delisting.

Lizhong footwear industry was founded in June 2010 in Hongkong. It is the sole shareholder of BELLE footwear (Beijing) Limited and BELLE shoe (Wuhan) Limited.

Louis Vuitton and BELLE international have their origins.

In 2007, Louis Vuitton's parent company LVMH group subscribed 2.7% of the new shares of BELLE international for $30 million. At that time, Hongkong public opinion believed that the investment of LVMH group highlighted the brand effect of BELLE international.

Design plagiarism has always been a problem that the fashion industry can not put an end to. Many brands have been accused of being infringed by design copyrights and have brought other companies to court.

But there are also successful cases in brand design and rights protection.

In July 2018, OTB, the parent company of Diesel and Marni, sued the Zara parent company Inditex group for its success in copying Diesel jeans and Marni sandals.

The lawsuit lasted for 3 years. Finally, the Milan court ruled that Zara infringed, requiring the Inditex group to recall the infringing goods and pay 235 dollars in compensation for each commodity.

This is the first time that Zara has lost the case in designing plagiarism cases.

In recent years, Louis Vuitton has been paying more and more attention to protecting the intellectual property rights of brands in the Chinese market.

In 2017, Louis Vuitton joined the Alibaba anti counterfeiting Alliance (AACA) and joined Alibaba in the same year to help Hunan police destroy a production, logistics and wholesale industrial chain of counterfeit Louis Vuitton products, involving a total amount of 200 million yuan.

In 2018, Louis Vuitton and Alibaba assisted Shanghai police in smashing the overseas sales network of luxury goods such as Louis Vuitton and so on, involving more than 100 million yuan.

Author: Zhang Xinyu