iPhone

Cisco has gone public with details of the iPhone deal with Apple Inc and seems to have made a good point for itself. This information comes directly from Mark Chandler, Cisco’s SVP and General Counsel. Also this comes on a coporate blog of Cisco which goes a long way to show the power blogging has in today’s world and how companies use it to manage its public relations. The post has excited a lot of bloggers and has won Cisco brownie points with them. Also if you read the post, it does blame Apple, but very subtly and in a corporate fashion, not a big deal coming from a senior counsel.

Also during negotiations with a certain vendor a few days ago the sales personnel there directed me to their corporate website for more information on their product. Way to go!! How I wish some people would listen.

I did some searching on this tussel myself this morning and summarised below are my findings.

The interesting thing here is that whereas Cisco (through acquisition of InfoGear) holds the trademark for “computer hardware and software for providing integrated telephone communication with computerized global information networks” (S.No. 75076573), Apple (through Ocean Telecom Services) holds the trademark for “handheld and mobile digital electronic devices…” and “hand-held unit for playing electronic games” (S.No. 77007808).

If you actually check out the description the Apple trademark is more specific to hand held mobile devices and it is not difficult to see why Apple is not too concerned about trademark infringement.