Apple Sued Over iPhone Trademark

Tech giant Cisco brought a trademark infringement suit against Apple on Wednesday, January 11, 2007 in District Court in the Northern District of California. Seeking a injunctive relief, Cisco claims that Apple's new iPhone violates its trademark.

The iPhone is Apple's highly-anticipated all-in-one device that can play music, surf the web, access email, and send and receive calls. Apple likely chose the name iPhone to mirror its existing family of 'i' products, including the iPod and iMac. The only problem is, Cisco has owned the trademark rights to iPhone since 2000 and has even labeled a brand of its own products with it.

According to Cisco, Apple has been trying for a few years to reach a licensing agreement with Cisco for rights to the name. The companies' lawyers were even working up until the time that Apple CEO Steve Jobs delivered the announcement for the iPhone. Cisco sued when the two sides couldn't reach a deal before Cisco's stated deadline.