Opinion ID: 3031461
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 3

Heading: absence of the likelihood of confusion

Text: The likelihood of confusion test centers on weighing the so-called Sleekcraft factors that range from the strength of the mark to the degree of care customers are likely to exercise. See AMF Inc. v. Sleekcraft Boats, 599 F.2d 341, 348-49 (9th Cir. 1979). These factors do not guide our analysis here, however, because the parties have, in effect, short circuited the case through their stipulation. [3] Determining whether the record sustains an infringement claim is not straightforward in this instance. This case is made more complicated by the parties’ efforts to resolve it via stipulation and subsequent dismissal of claims. Rather than a clean set of district court findings or a comprehensive opinion, we are left to piece together the meaning of the final judgment, which incorporates but modifies the court’s earlier Opinion and Order and encompasses the parties’ factual stipulations. Reading the record in conjunction with the final judgment leads us to conclude that there is no material issue of fact with respect to infringement, that ACBC failed to establish infringement and, consequently, the dismissal of claims was appropriate. The bulk of the record evidence relates to the nature of the circuit breakers sold by Oregon Breakers, namely whether they are genuine STAB-LOK circuit breakers and the quality control conditions of their manufacture. After much back and AMERICAN CIRCUIT BREAKER v. OREGON BREAKERS 4643 forth, the parties stipulated that there are no material differences between the black and the gray breakers, and that the gray breakers are “genuine” products in relation to the black breakers. [4] Because of this stipulation and the related court order, this case is governed by the rule we set out in NEC Elecs. v. Cal Circuit ABCO, 810 F.2d 1506, 1510 (9th Cir. 1987) (citations omitted): “Trademark law generally does not reach the sale of genuine goods bearing a true mark even though such sale is without the mark owner’s consent.” Here, the parties have agreed that the goods were genuine vis-a-vis the ACBC goods bearing the same mark.5 The NEC rule makes good sense and comports with the consumer protection rationale of trademark law: “[T]rademark law is designed to prevent sellers from confusing or deceiving consumers about the origin or make of a product, which confusion ordinarily does not exist when a genuine article bearing a true mark is sold.” Id. [5] The upshot of the stipulation between ACBC and Oregon Breakers is that consumers purchasing circuit breakers from Oregon Breakers are getting exactly the same circuit breaker, both in specification and quality, as they would purchase from ACBC. In other words, the goods are genuine. Rather than being confused, customers who purchase the gray STAB-LOK circuit breakers from Oregon Breakers get exactly what they expect. See Iberia Foods Corp. v. Romeo, 150 F.3d 298, 303 (3d Cir. 1998) (“[W]hen the differences between the products prove so minimal that consumers who purchase the alleged infringer’s goods ‘get precisely what they believed that they were purchasing,’ consumers’ perceptions of the trademarked goods are not likely to be affected by 5 Because of the unusual factual backdrop in this case and the multiple stipulations of the parties, we need not consider the situation in which goods bearing a foreign trademark are sold in the United States and the distributor markets goods “of one make under the trademark of another.” Champion Spark Plug Co. v. Sanders, 331 U.S. 125, 128 (1947). 4644 AMERICAN CIRCUIT BREAKER v. OREGON BREAKERS the alleged infringer’s sales.”) (internal citation omitted). In short, because there is no material fact as to infringement, ACBC’s claims of trademark infringement and unfair competition must fail. What is missing here is evidence of infringement that undermines ACBC’s goodwill or leaves consumers in a state of “legal confusion.” As the First Circuit observed: By and large, courts do not read Katzel and Aldridge to disallow the lawful importation of identical foreign goods carrying a valid foreign trademark. . . . [T]erritorial protection kicks in under the Lanham Act where two merchants sell physically different products in the same market and under the same name, for it is this prototype that impinges on a trademark holder’s goodwill and threatens to deceive consumers. Societe Des Produits Nestle, 982 F.2d at 637 (internal citations omitted). We do not need to go as far as our sister circuit’s circumscription of Katzel because the answer here is found in the parties’ stipulated record as to genuine products.