CELEX: C2001/150/60
Language: en
Date: 2001-05-19 00:00:00
Title: Case T-40/01: Action brought on 21 February 2001 by Scan Office Design S.A. against Commission of the European Communities

C 150/30              EN                     Official Journal of the European Communities                                     19.5.2001
Action brought on 20 February 2001 by Kabushiki Kaisha                  Decision of the Board of      Dismissal of the appeal.
Fernandes against the Office for Harmonization in the                   Appeal:
                        Internal Market
                                                                        Grounds of claim:             Infringement of article 8(1)(b) of
                                                                                                      Council Regulation 40/94 (1) or
                         (Case T-39/01)                                                               alternatively, infringement of a
                                                                                                      rule of law relating to the appli-
                                                                                                      cation of the Regulation — proof
                        (2001/C 150/59)                                                               of genuine use in the relevant
                                                                                                      Member States pursuant to
                                                                                                      article 43(3) of the Regulation.
                  (Language of the case: English)
                                                                        (1) Council Regulation (EC) No 40/94 of 20 December 1993 on the
                                                                            Community trade mark (OJ L 11, p. 1)
An action against the Office for Harmonization in the Internal
Market was brought before the Court of First Instance of the
European Communities on 20 February 2001 by Kabushiki
Kaisha Fernandes, Tokyo, Japan, represented by Richard
Hacon, Nicholas Phillips and Ian Wood of Rowe & Maw,
London. A further party to the proceedings before the Board
of Appeal was Richard John Harrison, Doncaster, United
Kingdom.
The applicant claims that the Court should:                             Action brought on 21 February 2001 by Scan Office
                                                                        Design S.A. against Commission of the European Com-
                                                                                                     munities
—     annul the decision of the First Board of Appeal of the
      Office for Harmonisation in the Internal Market dated
      4 December 2000 (Appeal No. R 0116/2000-1)                                                  (Case T-40/01)
—     order the Office to refuse the application to register the
      Community trade mark                                                                       (2001/C 150/60)
—     make an order for the applicant’s costs.
                                                                                           (Language of the case: French)
Pleas in law and main arguments                                         An action against the Commission of the European Communi-
                                                                        ties was brought before the Court of First Instance of the
                                                                        European Communities on 21 February 2001 by Scan Office
                                                                        Design S.A. of Brussels, represented by Benoît Mertens and
Applicant for the Com-       Richard John Harrison.
                                                                        Christophe Steyaert, Avocats.
munity trade mark:
The Community trade          Word mark ‘HIWATT’ for certain             The applicant claims that the Court should:
mark concerned:              goods in Class 9.
                                                                        —     order the European Commission to pay the applicant
Proprietor of the right to   The applicant.                                   EUR 118 651 150;
the trade mark or sign
asserted by way of oppo-
sition in the opposition                                                —     order the Commission to pay the costs.
proceedings:
Trade mark or sign           German, French and Italian word            Pleas in law and main arguments
asserted by way of oppo-     marks ‘HIWATT’, registered in
sition in the opposition     respect of certain goods in Class
proceedings:                 9.                                         The Commission issued invitation to tender no. 96/31/IX/C1
                                                                        (hierarchical office furniture — OJ S 164 of 27 August 1996)
Decision of the Oppo-        Rejection of the opposition.               pursuant to which the applicant filed a tender which was
sition Division:                                                        rejected by the Commission.
 ---pagebreak--- 19.5.2001              EN                      Official Journal of the European Communities                                       C 150/31
The applicant requests compensation in respect of the loss                The Commission responded to that request with two consecu-
allegedly suffered as a result of the Commission having                   tive refusals grounded on the requirements of ‘commercial
committed a fault for the purposes of Article 288 of the EC               secrecy’ and the ‘authorship rule’.
Treaty in awarding the contract to Frezza Belgium SA which
caused loss to the applicant, who was the only person to
have submitted a tender which complied with the product                   In the circumstances, the applicant takes the view that the
specification.                                                            Commission’s refusal on two separate occasions and for two
                                                                          contradictory reasons is unjustified and prevents an operator,
                                                                          whose economic activity is closely dependent on the market
                                                                          in bananas being regulated and in which the Commission has
                                                                          above all powers of oversight, from checking whether such
                                                                          regulation is being properly managed.
                                                                          In support of its arguments, the applicant claims infringement
                                                                          of the Code of Conduct adopted by the Commission by
Action brought on 1 March 2001 by CO-FRUTTA soc.                          94/90/ECSC, EC, EURATOM and Declaration No 17 appended
coop. a.r.l. against Commission of the European Com-                      to the Final Act of the Maastricht Treaty, as well as abuse of
                            munities                                      powers.
                         (Case T-47/01)
                        (2001/C 150/61)
                   (Language of the case: Italian)
                                                                          Action brought on 13 March 2001 by Carmine Salvatore
An action against the Commission of the European Communi-                               Tralli against European Central Bank
ties was brought before the Court of First Instance of the
European Communities on 1 March 2001 by CO-FRUTTA                                                    (Case T-56/01)
soc. coop. a.r.l., represented by Wilma Viscardini, Mariano
Paolin and Simonetta Donà, avvocati.
                                                                                                    (2001/C 150/62)
The applicant claims that the Court should:
                                                                                              (Language of the case: German)
—     annul the decision of the Commission — contained in
      the letter of 31 July 2000 of the Director General for
      Agriculture and letter of 5 December 2000 of the                    An action against the European Central Bank was brought
      Secretary General — whereby access was refused to the               before the Court of First Instance of the European Communities
      documents referred to in the request submitted by Co-               on 13 March 2001 by Carmine Salvatore Tralli, of Nidderau,
      Frutta on 27 June 2000 and again on 1 September 2000;               Germany, represented by Norbert Pflüger, Regina Steiner and
                                                                          Silvia Mittländer, with an address for service in Luxembourg.
—     order the Commission to pay the costs.
                                                                          The applicant claims that the Court should:
Pleas in law and main arguments
                                                                          1.    find that, in failing to respond in writing to the applicant
                                                                                in respect of his complaint, in accordance with a letter of
The applicant requested access to documents in the Com-                         5 February 2001, the defendant’s President infringed the
mission’s possession relating to the common organisation of                     last paragraph of Article 8.1.5 of the European Central
the market in bananas. That request was prompted by the fact                    Bank Staff Rules;
that it had come to the notice of the applicant that enormous
quantities of bananas had been imported into the Community                2.    in the event that some of the forms of order sought in
market under forged import licences or licences which had                       Case T-373/00 are refused:
been issued on the basis of false or erroneous reference
quantities. It therefore asked the Commission a copy of or, at
least, permission to consult on the premises, the lists of the                  —     annul the notice of dismissal issued by the defendant
operators registered in the Community or of the quantities                            of 29 November 2000;
they had respectively imported during the reference period
and therefore of the provisional reference quantity allocated to                —     find that the employment relationship between the
each of them, as well as the licences used and related                                parties continues to subsist unchanged beyond
documents.                                                                            31 December 2000;