SONY HOLDINGS LTD V. REGISTRAR OF TRADE MARKS SONY CORPORATION

JUDGMENT OF THE COURT

In contention in this appeal and indeed in the High Court is the proper construction of section 21 of the Trade Marks Act as read with Rules 46 and 102 of the Trade Marks Rules, and specifically whether the learned Judge of the High Court, (Warsame, J, as he then was) was right in holding, in relation to these provisions, that the Registrar of Trade Marks acted within his powers in extending time within which a notice of opposition to the registration of two trade marks could be lodged. This is how the question arose.

The appellant, Sony Holdings Limited submitted to the 1^st respondent, the Registrar of Trade Marks for registration and duly paid for two applications of its trade marks, “Sony Holdings” as a word and “Sony Holdings” as a word device. The applications were initially rejected for the reason that they were similar to another mark existing in the register with Trade Marks Nos. 97897 “SONY ” in the name of Sony Kabushiki Kaisha of Japan. The appellant wro…