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Kanye West is involved in a high-profile commercial dispute with a corporate giant-this time it was not initiated by him, and experts are confused.

The famous eccentric rapper-In the past year, despite the profitable business relationship with the two companies, he has blasted Gap and Adidas for not letting him on their board of directors in the past year -At the same time, a strange trademark dispute occurred with Wal-Mart.

On April 21, the world’s largest retailer claimed in a document submitted to the United States Patent and Trademark Office that the new “Rays from the Sun” logo designed for the Yeezy brand of the “Flashing LIghts” singer is the same as Wal-Mart’s 13-year-old spark. resemblance. Symbolizing consumers may confuse them.

Specifically, Wal-Mart believes that the new Yeezy logo — consisting of eight dotted lines emanating from a circle — is too similar to its sun logo, which consists of six solid lines surrounding a circle. The retailer stated that unless it is blocked, it will cause consumers to "confuse and deceive" and "dilute" the Wal-Mart brand.

But trademark experts are skeptical. Wal-Mart is a mass-market retailer known for its large stores full of discounted merchandise. A Wal-Mart Fruit of the Loom sweatshirt sells for $7.44. At the same time, the men's Yeezy hoodie is priced at $350 on Farfetch.

In fact, Yeezy's products have recently won an excellent reputation, even in the field of luxury goods, few people can match it. At the Sotheby's auction last month, Kanye West's Nike Air Yeezy 1 sneakers were sold for $1.8 million-the most expensive pair of shoes in history.

"The idea that Yeezy would deliberately associate herself with Wal-Mart in order to free-rider on Wal-Mart’s [reputation] — I don’t understand," Susan Scarfidy, founder and director of the Fashion Law Institute, told the Washington Post Newspaper. "Yeezy's tuxedo is very fashionable."

A legal expert who asked not to be named mocked Wal-Mart's objection as "within reach." "Yeezy does not want their products to appear in Wal-Mart, nor do they want to be confused with Wal-Mart."

More importantly, the US Patent and Trademark Office announced its plan to approve the trademark by publishing the trademark in the Official Trademark Gazette in December. Experts say this means that the agency lets examiners look at thousands of potentially similarly described registered trademarks to ensure that Yeezy's logo does not infringe any of them.

"It is more likely that the examiner saw the Wal-Mart logo and believed that consumers could tell the difference between the two," Scafidi said.

"The examiner must find evidence of no conflicting logos before publication," Brown Rudnick trademark attorney Jason Sobel agreed.

According to sources close to the patent dispute, after Yeezy first applied for a patent on January 3, 2020, “it took a year for the Trademark Office” to approve the release of the logo. "It has gone through some back and forth, but the government has never mentioned Wal-Mart's trademark," the person said.

As previously reported by The Washington Post, Wal-Mart filed a formal complaint last month after trying to negotiate with Yeezy on five different occasions in July.

But Scafidi said, "Most of the trademarks issued for opposition are eventually registered."

"Walmart has repeatedly tried to understand Yeezy's planned use of the Yeezy app, with the goal of finding ways in which Walmart's Spark design and Yeezy app can coexist," the retailer wrote in a letter to the Yeezy trademark agent. , Robert Ross April 19th.

"However, so far, we have not received any decisive information from Yeezy regarding the planned use, nor have we received any cooperation from Yeezy to find common ground."  

According to government documents, Yeezy must respond by May 31.