Behind the curtains

RIGA - Latvia and Estonia are both members of the World Trade Organization and Lithuania will officially join the international trade group later this year. As members of WTO, all three countries are obligated to adhere to international standards and intellectual property protection and enforcement.

"Trademark and patent infringements are significant obstacles to any country seeking to expand foreign investment and international trade," Coalition for Intellectual Property Rights Vice President Tom Thomson said. "While all three countries have made significant progress in enacting intellectual property laws and regulations, problems with law enforcement and impartial court adjudication persist."

Peter G. Kelly of the U.S. law firm Principal, Updike, Kelly and Spellacy, said Baltic courts will see more cases of trademark disputes in the near future.

"The legislation is not the problem. It's how its enforced," Kelly said.

Behind the curtains there are already many copyright cases passing through Baltic courts.

Coca-Cola was fighting a local Latvian soda company over the Fanta trademark, a U.S. airline company fought over the right to use the word Delta as a part of its name in Lithuania, the U.S. vodka brand Smirnoff is taking on its Russian counterpart Smirnov and perhaps the most famous copyright war in history - Budweiser vs. Budweiser.

In 1265, King Premysl Otakar II founded a city he called Ceske Budejovice - Budweis in German, an important city in his kingdom. To accentuate this he gave the city a few privileges, and one of them was the right to brew beer. Beer sales picked up gradually over the years and spread throughout Europe.

Still, the official name Budweiser Budvar did not appear until June 24 1895, which is 19 years after the name Budweiser showed up in the United States.

In 1857 German immigrant Adolphus Busch arrived in St. Louis, where he married Eberhard Anheuser's daughter Lilly. Busch started working in his father-in-law's brewery in 1864 and 16 years later Busch became president of Anheuser-Busch Brewing Association. Still, it would take a few more years until the big trademark feud between Budweiser and Budweiser started.

The first court case commenced in 1911, and the two label holders have been fighting each other ever since in almost every country where they are trying to get market shares.

Frank Hellwig, senior associate general council for Anheuser-Busch companies, said the dispute between Budweiser and Budweiser Budvar has been going on in Latvia for some years already.

"They [Budweiser Budvar] are trying to have our Budweiser registration canceled in Latvia, said Hellwig. "So to retaliate, we have filed for their brand to be canceled in Latvia."

When asked if it is possible that Adolphus Busch took the name Budweiser from the Czech city Ceske Budejovice before he migrated to the United States, Hellwig said Busch only chose that particular name because there was a large German population living in St. Louis at that time, and "Budweiser sounds German."

Budweiser Budvar is not allowed to sell any beer in the United States under the name Budweiser.

"They agreed to this already in 1939," Hellwig said.

The latest legal dispute started June 26 this year in Finland when Anheuser-Busch filed a law suit at the municipal court in Helsinki, attempting to ban the sale of Budweiser Budvar in Finland. The Finnish League of Beer Associations sided with Budweiser Budvar in the court, which refused to ban Budweiser Budvar. However, the battle in Finland over the right to the name Budweiser is just beginning.

"This is the longest trademark dispute in general," said Hellwig.

Budweiser Budvar does not have any representation in Latvia and neither does Anheuser-Busch. Budweiser Budvar chose not to comment.