22.9.2012

Official Journal of the European Union

C 287/25

Appeal brought on 17 July 2012 by Mizuno KK against the judgment of the General Court (Fourth Chamber) of 8 May 2012 in Case T-101/11 Mizuno KK v Office for Harmonisation in the Internal Market (Trade Marks and Designs)

(Case C-341/12 P)

2012/C 287/48

Language of the case: German

Parties to the proceedings

Appellant: Mizuno KK (represented by: T. Wessing, T. Raab and H. Lauf, Rechtsanwälte)

Other party to the proceedings: Office for Harmonisation in the Internal Market (Trade Marks and Designs)(OHIM)

Form of order sought

The appellant claims that the Court should:

—	set aside the judgment of the General Court of 8 May 2012 in Case T-101/11 and the decision of the First Board of Appeal of OHIM of 15 December 2010 — Case R 0821/2010-1;

—	order the other party to the proceedings to pay the costs incurred both at first instance and in the present proceedings.

Grounds of appeal and main arguments

The present appeal challenges the General Court’s judgment of 8 May 2012 in Case T-101/11, whereby the General Court dismissed the appellant’s action against the decision of the First Board of Appeal of OHIM of 15 December 2010 (Case R 821/2010-1) relating to opposition proceedings between Golfino AG and Mizuno KK.

The appellant bases its appeal essentially on the following grounds:

The General Court erred in law in its assessment of the scope of protection and the distinctiveness of an existing figurative mark comprising the letter ‘G’ and the symbol ‘+’. The General Court wrongly proceeded on the basis that the combination of both those elements was of no importance.

Hence, the General Court wrongly found that there was a likelihood of confusion between the earlier figurative mark and the mark applied for by the appellant, comprising the letter ‘G’, the symbol ‘+’, and an arrow symbol, inasmuch as, in the assessment of the similarity of the signs, the General Court did not focus on the overall impression of the two marks, but rather on their individual details.

In doing so, the General Court incorrectly assumed that the similarity of the letter ‘G’ in both figurative marks was of greater importance than their other, different, elements. In order properly to assess the marks, the General Court ought, however, to have examined only the overall symbols, and not focused on the letters ‘G’ in isolation.

Although it is true that both of the marks at issue consist in the phoneme/g/, the focal point of the marks clearly lies in their graphic design and not in their phonetic arrangement. Consequently, the existence of a likelihood of confusion between the two marks has not been shown.