Obelix conquers Luxembourg

[Marcel Pemsel]

Obelix conquers Luxembourg

Marcel Pemsel Thursday, May 21, 2026 - General Court, link, Marcel Pemsel, Obelix, reputation, T-24/25, trade marks

Asterix and Obelix conquered the entire Roman Empire with their wits and fists by mastering twelve Herculean tasks. Since this does not work outside films and comics, someone thought it would be a good idea to protect "Obelix" as a trade mark for weapons. In Les Éditions Albert René v EUIPO (case T‑24/25), the General Court dealt with the question whether the reputation of the "Obelix" trade mark for printed matter, film production and other goods and services was sufficient to knock the trade mark for weapons out of the register.  

Background

In 2020, the Polish company WORKS 11 MICHAŁ LUBIŃSKI filed an application for the EU word mark "Obelix". The mark was registered in 2022 for various types of weapons and accessories, including "machine guns, hand grenades, mortars, tear-gas weapons, tanks".

Les Éditions Albert René ("LEAR"), the French publishing house that manages the rights in the Asterix & Obelix franchise, applied for a declaration of invalidity of the aforementioned mark. It relied on its EU word mark "OBELIX", registered in 1998 for goods and services in classes 9, 16, 25, 28 and 41, covering products ranging from printed matter to games, playthings, clothing and entertainment services, including film production and amusement parks.

LEAR invoked a likelihood of confusion and the broader protection afforded to marks with a reputation.

The Cancellation Division of the European Union Intellectual Property Office ("EUIPO") rejected the application, finding the evidence insufficient to prove genuine use of the earlier mark.

The EUIPO’s Board of Appeal ("BoA") dismissed LEAR’s appeal. The BoA assumed that genuine use had been established. It denied a likelihood of confusion because the goods and services were dissimilar. The BoA rejected claims based on Art. 8(5) EUTMR because the evidence did not allow a "definite conclusion" on reputation and there was no link between the marks.

LEAR brought an action before the General Court and accepted that there was no likelihood of confusion.

The General Court's decision

The General Court annulled the contested decision.

1. Identity of signs and relevant public

First, the judges confirmed that the signs are identical.

The findings on the relevant public for the contested mark are unclear. In an earlier statement (at para. 34), the judges accepted that the contested mark targeted a very specialized public as well as, in rare cases and subject to compliance with strict rules, members of the general public, both of which have a very high level of attention. In a later paragraph (64), the judges reiterated the BoA’s finding that the goods of the contested mark only “targeted a very specialised public, namely military personnel, hunters, security specialists and police officers”.

The relevant public for the earlier mark was the general public.

2. Reputation

The BoA found that the fame of the "Asterix & Obelix" comic books did not necessarily imply that the relevant public, upon seeing the sign "Obelix" on its own affixed to products such as toys, books, DVDs or board games, would perceive it as a trade mark in the sense of an indicator of commercial origin but rather as a mere descriptive reference to a character from the comic book series.

The Court frowned upon this reasoning because the BoA neglected the ® symbol that was used right next to the term "Obelix". This indicates to consumers that the term is a trade mark.

The judges also noted that the combined use of "Asterix & Obelix" does not exclude "Obelix" from being perceived as a separate trade mark. EU law does not require a trade mark to be used in isolation. A mark may obtain and enjoy a reputation when it is used in combination with another mark, provided that the distinctive character is not altered. Since "Asterix & Obelix" was frequently used with the ® symbol behind "Asterix" and behind "Obelix", the relevant public could understand "Obelix" as a separate indication of commercial origin. Thus, the BoA was wrong to disregard the evidence relating to "Asterix & Obelix". 

3. Link between the marks

The BoA denied that the relevant public establishes a link between the marks. It found that the goods and services were completely dissimilar, there was no proximity between the relevant market sectors and it was unlikely that LEAR’s commercial activities would expand to include firearms, explosives and weapons. The BoA also held that the contested mark targeted military personnel, hunters, security specialists and police officers, whereas the relevant public of the earlier mark was the general public. These two groups did not overlap, which, in itself, excluded the finding of a link.

The Court criticized that the BoA did not take all relevant factors into account. Neither an (assumed) degree of reputation nor the uniqueness and degree of distinctiveness of the earlier mark were considered. The BoA focused incorrectly only on the lack of similarity between the goods and services and the lacking overlap between the relevant publics.

Comment

1. The decision shows the difficulty of protecting characters from books, films and comics. Their names and likeness are often famous, but not necessarily as a source indicator for specific goods or services but as a reference to a fictitious person. "Obelix" has a reputation for being a character in beloved comics and films but does it also function as an indication of origin for games, playthings, film production and if so, does it have a reputation for such goods? LEAR uses the fame of the character Obelix to exploit it for typical merchandise. The mark "Obelix" may – if perceived as a source indicator – have a reputation for comics and films production but probably not for other goods and services.

2. If such a reputation is established, the findings on the relevant public are important for the overall assessment of the link between the marks. If the contested mark also targeted the general public (albeit to a limited extent because of strict gun regulations in the EU), there would be some overlap between the relevant publics. However, this overlap would not apply to all goods of the contested mark because it also contains products that are most certainly not sold to private individuals in the EU, such as tanks or hand grenades. Thus, many of the goods of the contested mark only target a very specialised public, namely Member States and their militaries. This might lead to a differentiated result in the decision the BoA has to render as a consequence of the General Court's judgment.

3. The General Court placed significant weight on the use of the ® symbol. This is not entirely in line with previous case law. For instance, in case T-46/25, the judges found that the use of the symbol had only very limited impact on the perception of a mark by the general public. As a consequence, the use of the ® will not make a non-distinctive mark distinctive (eg. T-15/16 at para. 44). It does also not show that a sign is used as a trade mark (T-205/20 at para. 91). Be that as it may, attaching the ® symbol is advisable, especially if it is debatable whether a sign is perceived as a trade mark.