Louis Vuitton found guilty of copyright infringement

The famous luxury house Louis Vuitton was recently ordered by the Paris Court of Appeal to pay 700,000 euros in damages to the designer of the “LV tournant” lock for infringement of her copyright.

The case was between the independent designer Jocelyne Imbert and Louis Vuitton Malletier (LVM), for whom she had created the “LV tournant” lock in 1988. In return for the transfer of rights to the lock for city, travel and leisure bags, the company undertook to pay the designer a fixed fee. Under the terms of successive contracts between the parties, it was also stipulated that if a new range of bags or a new line of bags used the said lock, the designer would receive a new payment of 436,500 francs (approximately €66,500), excluding tax.

However, the designer discovered that LVM was using the clasp on its new lines of bags called TWIST and GO, as well as on other products not covered by their contract.

On March 11, the Paris Court of Appeals ordered Louis Vuitton Malletier to pay the designer of the lock “133,088 euros (excluding taxes) for the marketing of TWIST and GO bags with the ‘LV tournant’ lock” under the terms of the contract signed by the parties in 1992, and “700,000 Euros in damages for the unauthorized use of [the lock] on wallets, bracelets, shoes, belts and key rings“.

Louis Vuitton Malletier has already announced that it will appeal to the French Cour de cassation.

This decision underlines the scope of the rights and protection granted to the author of a work, but also, and above all, the importance of strict compliance with the principles laid down by the law. The scope of the transfer must be carefully circumscribed by the parties: each of the rights transferred must be mentioned separately in the transfer deed and the field of exploitation of the rights transferred must be delimited as to its extent and destination, as to the place and as to the duration (article L131-3 of the French Intellectual Property Code).

will assist you in all stages, from the protection of the work, to the understanding of the different stakes and economic implications, to the formalization of the contract, which is often delicate from both a “psychological” and legal point of view. In particular, contracts require strict compliance with legal obligations, the non-compliance of which often leads to the nullity of the contract itself.

− Anaïs GREFFOZ, Intellectual Property Lawyer at Mark & Law

Sources:

• Paris Court of Appeal, Pôle 05, ch. 2, March 11, 2022, 20/08972
• Louis Vuitton condamné pour contrefaçon. Challenges.fr [online]. March 25, 2022. [Viewed on April 6, 2022]. Available: https://www.challenges.fr/luxe/louis-vuitton-condamne-pour-contrefacon_806481