Makemytrip India Private Limited Vs Booking.Com B. V. & Ors. (Delhi High Court)
Facts- The Plaintiff – MakeMyTrip (India) Pvt. Ltd. had filed the suit for permanent injunction seeking protection of its registered trademarks ‘MakeMyTrip’ and its variants. It was the case of the Plaintiff that the Plaintiff’s marks are being used by Booking.com B.V. as keywords on the Google Ads Program for promoting their services as advertisements when search results are displayed on the Google search engine.
In the present case, the Plaintiff is aggrieved by the use of the mark ‘MakeMyTrip’ as a keyword by the Defendant No.1 on the Google Ads Program. The case of the Plaintiff is that when a search is carried out for ‘MakeMyTrip’ in the Google search bar, quite often the first advertisement which is displayed in the search results in the advertisement category is that of Defendant No.1- Booking.com, who is one of the major competitors of the Plaintiff. The Plaintiff has placed on record the screenshots of the search results, as well as auction insight of its own account on Google Ads Program to show that Defendant No.1- Booking.com has made bids for the keyword ‘makemytrip’ on the Google Ads Program in order to ensure that its website is shown as one of top three search results in the advertisement category when someone searches for ‘MakeMyTrip’ on Google. According to the Plaintiff, such use of its registered mark would constitute infringement, especially when done by its competitor such as booking.com.
Being aggrieved by the same the plaintiff had moved High Court.
Conclusion- This Court is prima facie of the opinion that the use of the Plaintiff’s registered mark ‘MakeMyTrip’ on the Google Ads Program as a keyword would amount to trademark infringement. The same would be detrimental to the Plaintiff’s monetary interest as also to the brand equity of the Plaintiff’s mark. To allow competitors such as www.booking.com and even Google to encash upon the reputation of the Plaintiff’s mark for their own monetary advantage is not permissible in the opinion of the Court. The balance of convenience lies in the favour of the Plaintiff and if the injunction is not granted, Defendant and other competitors would continue to bid for its mark `MakeMyTrip’ on a daily basis, resulting in severe prejudice to the Plaintiff, its mark, its brand equity and its business.
Under these circumstances, the Defendants are restrained from using the mark ‘MakeMyTrip’ together/ in conjunction, with or without spaces for the purpose of using it as a keyword on the Google Ads Program till the next date of hearing. However, this shall not prevent the Defendants from using words ‘make’, ‘my’, ‘trip’ not conjunctively on a standalone basis in a descriptive or generic sense on the Google Ads Program.
FULL TEXT OF THE JUDGMENT/ORDER OF DELHI HIGH COURT
