French CD/DVD packaging design and manufacturing company Key Solutions has won a court case again Portuguese company VDS PAK for counterfeiting of products by third party Mango with which Key Solutions has exclusive commercialisation rights.

The High Court of Lyon ordered VDS PAK to desist from manufacturing, importing, promoting and/or selling the various contentious packaging models, accusing the Portuguese company of unfair competition against the French plaintiffs

VDSPAK is ordered to pay Key Solutions and Mango damages of €10,000 (half the €20,000 demanded) and to Mango the legal costs of €3,000. Furthermore, the court compels VDSPAK to publish on its website for a month the court ruling.

VDSPAK was set up by Nelson Vieira upon leaving Key Solutions where he had spent four years as trainee then head of sales. In 2008, Key Solutions discovered a website run by Vieira which was selling counterfeits of packaging products which Key Solutions identified as being its own, designed by Mango with which it has an exclusive commercial representation.

Citing unfair competition, Key Solutions notes that Vieira, a former employee, knew the product design and commercial potential of the models he copied and sold on his website. The court heard a Key Solutions accountant who witnessed Vieira photocopying documents and taking away boxes of product samples.

VDSPAK filed a counterclaim for “denigration” and for the fact that the products it sold were purely utilitarian in character and did not involve creative input, therefore falling outside patent protection. The Court rejected this counterclaim.

“We will protect vigorously our company’s product designs and patents from counterfeiters,” says Jean-Noel Fournillier, Managing Director of Key Solutions

VDSPAK went into voluntary liquidation.

Story filed 19.07.10