Court of Justice of the EU (CJEU) rules on court jurisdiction in trademark infringement cases

The CJEU issued a ruling in Case C-172/18 AMS Neve and Others v Heritage Audio and Rodríguez Arribasan on the jurisdiction of EU courts when an action is brought for infringement of an EU trademark by online advertising. According to the CJEU, the infringement action can be filed in the courts of an EU member country where the advertising and sales offers were shown. In the ruling, the CJEU stated that: “Where the acts allegedly committed by the defendant consist of advertising and offers for sale displayed electronically with respect to products bearing a sign identical or similar to an EU trade mark without the consent of the proprietor of that mark, it is necessary, […] to hold that those acts […] were committed in the territory where the consumers or traders to whom that advertising and those offers for sale are directed are located, notwithstanding the fact that the defendant is established elsewhere, that the server of the electronic network that he uses is located elsewhere, or even that the products that are the subject of such advertising and offers for sale are located elsewhere.”