| With the development of the market economy, trademark plays an increasingly important role and the infringement species become diversified. Reverse confusion, as a newcomer entering to the market, nowadays has been increasingly occurred. In academia,most scholars pay close attention to the harm,features,constitutive requirements,and responsibility of reverse confusion, but very few of them care about the settlement mechanism. Therefore, according to the features of reverse confusion, judicial practice and overseas experience,this thesis tries to offer some suggestions to the settlement of reverse confusion cases. This thesis is divided into 5 parts.Part 1 is the concept of the reverse confusion. This part introduces the concept and the main features of reverse confusion.Part 2 discusses the complexity of the judging standard. On the one hand, as the perniciousness of the reverse confusion,there is a necessity to confirm infringement to trademark rights for such kind of confusion. On the other hand, prohibition of the use of trademark to the subsequent user would lead to the waste of market resources. Therefore,there is a conflict between equality and efficiency in the judgment.Part 3 states the problems of present settlement. In practice,the relevant legislation is too simple and the judicial judgment lacks the standards.Part 4 provides the suggestions to the settlement mechanism to the reverse confusion cases. Judging case by case,balancing the interests and giving priority to mediation should be established as the principle. Moreover,consumer survey system, obligatory license and punitive damages could be introduced to the settlement. And the judgments should vary from the parties’ aim, acts and consumer survey results.Part 5 is the conclusion. Neither confirming infringement nor the prohibition of the use of the relevant trademark is the best settlement to reverse confusion cases. Diversified settlement mechanism should be applied in different cases. |
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