A trip and Intellectual Property  

I am very eager to share a travel tale of mine to the picturesque city of Gangtok, Sikkim; where the mighty Himalayas bekons you from every corner. 

Despite, surrounded by such beauty, I couldn't fail to notice happenings related to IPR around me. The different brands that I came across and few other IP related activities caught my attention deeply. 

Firstly , I came across few goods that were happily being sold and used under some popular brands. Below are the pictures of such goods. 

This  led me to  ponder, whether the brand owners are blind to such infringement or such usage gives them some unknown benefits or is it beyond their control to stop such misuse.

Being a tourist destination it has a lot of scope for IPR.

Secondly, I hope everybody is aware of this recently emerging and popular brand called mini SO. They  have many things including stationary items,bags foot wear, soft toys, cosmetics and so on. Personally, I am quite impressed with this brand. This brand doesn't  sell anything new but their strength lies in there designs. This is called  industrial design. I appreciate the way they made use of industrial designs to sell everyday products in attractive forms and packages. 

This being said, it's important to mention that in Calcutta, I came across a similar shop  with a similar name called Mumu So and I was perplexed . This so called brand called Mumu So not only sounds similar to the brand MINI SOU but also has identical products. However, I have not found this brand quite popular in my city,  Chennai.  

I was confused has to who has copied whom? After digging deep I came to understand something about these brands that can be the subject matter of another post.