US-based energy drinks manufacturer, Monster Energy Company (MEC) has failed in its attempt to prevent South Korea’s YG Entertainment from registering the trademarks BabyMonster and BabyMonsters for its new K-pop girl group, BabyMonster in Singapore, in a trademark lawsuit filed in Singapore court.
According to court documents dated 29 December, intellectual property adjudicator Ravindran turned down MEC’s objections upon examination of the company’s grounds of oppositions, noting that he has analysed the competing marks conceptually, visually and aurally, and found BabyMonster’s to be more dissimilar than similar to Monster Energy’s.
YG, the record label and talent agency which manages BabyMonster, applied to protect in Singapore the trademark BabyMonster on 22 May 2020, and the trademark BabyMonsters on 6 April 2021.
MEC is a global leader in the energy drinks industry and owns at least 33 registered trademarks in Singapore, with many of them including the word ‘monster’. It has been selling its energy drinks in Singapore since October 2012.
