Shivani Thakur
Published on: April 30, 2022 at 15:17 IST
The Delhi High Court has restrained Booking.com and Google from using the mark ‘MakeMyTrip’ as a keyword on the search engine’s Ads Program.
Justice Prathiba M Singh, in her Interim Order passed on a lawsuit by MakeMyTrip (Plaintiff), Prima Facie opined that the use of the ‘MakeMyTrip’ mark on the Google Ads Program as a keyword by its competitor would amount to Trademark Infringement and be detrimental to the Plaintiff’s monetary interest and brand equity.
The Justice stated that Plaintiff can “surely use its Trademark as a keyword on the Google Ads Program if it wishes to promote itself on the search engine”.
“This Court is Prima Facie of the opinion that the use of Plaintiff’s registered mark ‘MakeMyTrip’ on the Google Ads Program as a keyword would amount to trademark infringement. The same would be detrimental to the Plaintiff’s monetary interest as also to the brand equity of the Plaintiff’s mark. To allow competitors such as HYPERLINK http://www.booking.comwww.booking.com and even Google to encash upon the reputation of the Plaintiff’s mark for their monetary advantage is not permissible in the opinion of the Court,” Court said in its Order.
“Under these circumstances, the Defendants (Booking.com and Google) are restrained from using the mark ‘MakeMyTrip’ together/ in Conjunction, with or without spaces for the purpose of using it as a keyword on the Google Ads Program till the next date of hearing. However, this shall not prevent the Defendants from using words ‘make’, ‘my’, ‘trip’ not conjunctively on a standalone basis in a descriptive or generic sense on the Google Ads Program,” the Court ordered.
The Court issued summons to the Defendants on the lawsuit which claimed that its marks were being used by Booking.com BV as keywords on the Google Ads Program, and sought their response.
Booking.com opposed the grant of Interim Relief to the Plaintiff on several grounds including that the words ‘make’, ‘my’, and ‘trip’ can be used in a generic and descriptive fashion, which ought not to be Injuncted.
The Court granted one week to the Defendant to submit response and adjourned the matter till 27 July.
