BGN Super Foods agrees not to infringe Cargill’s Intellectual Property Right

A settlement was successfully reached in the Commercial High Court of Colombo where the Intellectual Property Rights of the Plaintiff, Cargills (Ceylon) PLC, were recognised and enforced. 

On 11 October, the Defendant, BGN Super Food City Ltd., entered into settlement terms with the Plaintiff regarding the rights in the Trademarks of the Plaintiff’s nationwide supermarket chain, ‘Cargills Food City’.

The Plaintiff, as pleaded to Court, is one of the largest, most successful and acclaimed conglomerates in the country, dating back to 1844 and having multiple business operations spanning diversified areas from consumer goods and food brands to banking, restaurants and logistics. In 1983, the Plaintiff launched ‘Cargills Food City’, the first supermarket chain in Sri Lanka. Over the decades to follow, ‘Cargills Food City’ expanded to well over 350 stores in all districts of the country, becoming a household name in Sri Lanka with a reputation for high quality consumer products available at affordable prices. The red and white design of the Plaintiff’s Trademark ‘Food City’ along with its famous slogan ‘Gedara Yana Gaman’ as per the Plaintiff is exclusively and distinctively associated with none other than ‘Cargills Food City’.

The Plaintiff Cargills instituted the action in the Commercial High Court by Plaint dated 1 August on the grounds that the Defendant, a convenience store in Polgasowita, was unlawfully using the term ‘Food City’ along with a slogan visually and phonetically misleadingly similar to the Plaintiff’s slogan ‘Gedara Yana Gaman’, both being constituent parts of the Plaintiff’s Trademark ‘Cargills Food City’, in addition to using the red and white get-up of the Plaintiff’s Trademark ‘Food City’, on their external hoardings and billboards.

The Defendant, BGN, as a matter of settlement, resorted to change their billboards, hoardings and other advertising materials to a form that is completely different to that of the Plaintiff and to refrain from using the terms ‘Food City’, ‘Gedara Yana Gaman’ or any other term similar and/or identical to the Trademarks of the Plaintiff. BGN further agreed to not use the ‘Food City’ trade name. The Terms of Settlement on which BGN undertook to implement the aforesaid acts were entered in the Commercial High Court before High Court Judge Rathnapriya Gurusinghe on 11 October, thereby concluding the case.

The Plaintiff was represented in Court by Dr. Harsha Cabral, President’s Counsel, who appeared with Nishan Premathiratne and Migara Cabral Attorneys-at-Law, on the instructions of Messrs. Julius & Creasy.