Corte di giustizia UE/2019

[OSCURATO:PERSONA] ([OSCURATO:PERSONA]) 8 May 2019 ( * ) (Application for revision — [OSCURATO:PERSONA] 159 of the Rules of Procedure of the [OSCURATO:PERSONA] — Conditions — Appeal — Failure to raise a new fact — Inadmissibility) [OSCURATO:PERSONA] C‑118/18 P-REV, APPLICATION seeking the revision of the order of 28 June 2018, [OSCURATO:PERSONA] v EUIPO (C‑118/18 P, not published, EU:C:2018:522), brought on 27 September 2018, [OSCURATO:PERSONA] GmbH, formerly [OSCURATO:PERSONA] GmbH, established in Neu-Isenburg ([OSCURATO:PERSONA]), represented by J. Jennings, Rechtsanwalt, applicant for revision, the other parties to the proceedings being: [OSCURATO:PERSONA] (EUIPO), represented by A. Folliard-Monguiral, acting as Agent, defendant at first instance, [OSCURATO:PERSONA]. , formerly [OSCURATO:PERSONA] Inc., established in [OSCURATO:PERSONA] ([OSCURATO:PERSONA]), represented by S. Clotten, Rechtsanwalt, intervener at first instance, [OSCURATO:PERSONA] ([OSCURATO:PERSONA]), composed of F. [OSCURATO:PERSONA], [OSCURATO:PERSONA] of the [OSCURATO:PERSONA], C.G. Fernlund and L.S. Rossi (Rapporteur), [OSCURATO:PERSONA], [OSCURATO:PERSONA]: G. [OSCURATO:PERSONA], [OSCURATO:PERSONA]: A. [OSCURATO:PERSONA], having regard to the written procedure, after hearing the [OSCURATO:PERSONA], G. [OSCURATO:PERSONA], makes the following [OSCURATO:PERSONA] 1 By its application, [OSCURATO:PERSONA] GmbH, formerly [OSCURATO:PERSONA] GmbH, brought an application for revision of the order of 28 June 2018, [OSCURATO:PERSONA] v EUIPO (C‑118/18 P, not published, ‘the order under appeal’, EU:C:2018:522), pursuant to [OSCURATO:PERSONA] 44 of the Statute of the [OSCURATO:PERSONA] of [OSCURATO:PERSONA] of the [OSCURATO:PERSONA]. 2 By that order, the [OSCURATO:PERSONA], in accordance with [OSCURATO:PERSONA] 181 of its Rules of Procedure, dismissed the appeal brought by [OSCURATO:PERSONA] against the judgment of the [OSCURATO:PERSONA] of the [OSCURATO:PERSONA] of 12 December 2017, [OSCURATO:PERSONA] v EUIPO — [OSCURATO:PERSONA] (bittorrent) (T‑771/15, not published, EU:T:2017:887), as being in part manifestly inadmissible and in part manifestly unfounded. Background to the application for revision 3 On 6 June 2003, the applicant for revision, [OSCURATO:PERSONA], filed a request for registration of the word mark ‘bittorrent’ as an EU trade mark with the [OSCURATO:PERSONA] (EUIPO). On 5 August 2003, that company also applied for registration as a national trade mark of the same word mark ‘bittorrent’ with the [OSCURATO:PERSONA]- und Markenamt ([OSCURATO:PERSONA] and [OSCURATO:PERSONA]). 4 On 8 June 2006, that sign was registered as an EU trade mark. 5 On 24 June 2011, the intervener at first instance, [OSCURATO:PERSONA]., formerly [OSCURATO:PERSONA] Inc., filed an application for revocation of that mark with EUIPO, on the ground that that mark had not been put to genuine use in the [OSCURATO:PERSONA] in connection with the services concerned within a continuous period of five years. [OSCURATO:PERSONA] also filed an application for revocation of the corresponding [OSCURATO:PERSONA] trade mark with the [OSCURATO:PERSONA] ([OSCURATO:PERSONA], [OSCURATO:PERSONA], [OSCURATO:PERSONA]). 6 On 21 November 2011, that is on the last day of the time limit set by EUIPO for that purpose, [OSCURATO:PERSONA] responded to the request to submit evidence of genuine use of that mark in the [OSCURATO:PERSONA] by transmitting a letter by fax which contained a ‘list of evidence’ and referred to ‘items of evidence’ in attached documents. However, those documents were not attached to the letter and were received by post three days after the expiry of the abovementioned time limit. 7 By decision of 24 September 2013, the [OSCURATO:PERSONA] of EUIPO upheld the application for revocation of the EU mark. 8 On 19 November 2013, [OSCURATO:PERSONA] brought an appeal before EUIPO against the decision of the [OSCURATO:PERSONA]. [OSCURATO:PERSONA] of Appeal of EUIPO, after finding that it had failed to produce any relevant evidence before the [OSCURATO:PERSONA] within the given time limit, dismissed that appeal on the ground that genuine use had not been established. However, for the sake of completeness, the [OSCURATO:PERSONA] of Appeal assessed the evidence which was produced out of time, including the evidence produced before it, and held that that evidence did not establish that the mark at issue had been put to use. 9 By decision of 31 August 2015, the [OSCURATO:PERSONA] of Appeal held that the revocation of the EU mark would be pronounced with effect from 24 June 2011. 10 However, the application for revocation of the [OSCURATO:PERSONA] mark bittorrent, filed in parallel by [OSCURATO:PERSONA] before the national court was dismissed. The judgment upholding that application, given by the [OSCURATO:PERSONA] ([OSCURATO:PERSONA]) was subject to revision by the judgment of the [OSCURATO:PERSONA] ([OSCURATO:PERSONA], [OSCURATO:PERSONA]) of 15 April 2015 which held that as far as concerns four services covered by the [OSCURATO:PERSONA] mark bittorrent the latter had been put to use justifying the maintenance of the rights in respect of that mark. The judgment of the [OSCURATO:PERSONA] ([OSCURATO:PERSONA], [OSCURATO:PERSONA]) was confirmed by the judgment of the Bundesgerichtshof ([OSCURATO:PERSONA] of [OSCURATO:PERSONA], [OSCURATO:PERSONA]) of 29 June 2017, and therefore became final. 11 The action brought before the [OSCURATO:PERSONA] against the decision of the [OSCURATO:PERSONA] of Appeal of EUIPO, of 31 August 2015, revoking the EU mark was dismissed by judgment of 12 December 2017, [OSCURATO:PERSONA] v EUIPO — [OSCURATO:PERSONA] (bittorrent) (T‑771/15, not published, EU:T:2017:887). 12 [OSCURATO:PERSONA] then brought an appeal seeking to have that judgment set aside, in support of which it raised four grounds of appeal, based on the infringement of [OSCURATO:PERSONA] 51(1)(a) and [OSCURATO:PERSONA] 76 of [OSCURATO:PERSONA] (EC) No 207/2009 of 26 February 2009 on the Community trade mark (OJ 2009 L 78, p. 1) and based on the failure to consider the evidence. 13 For the reasons set out in paragraphs 8, 9, 11, 12, 17, 18, 21, 22 and 25 of the View of [OSCURATO:PERSONA], cited in paragraph 5 of the order under appeal, and for the reason set out in paragraph 6 of that order, the [OSCURATO:PERSONA] dismissed the appeal in its entirety, by reasoned order, as being, in part manifestly inadmissible and in part manifestly unfounded. Forms of order sought by the parties before the [OSCURATO:PERSONA] of [OSCURATO:PERSONA] 14 [OSCURATO:PERSONA] claims that the [OSCURATO:PERSONA] should –        open the procedure for revision of the order; –        set aside the judgment of the [OSCURATO:PERSONA] of 12 December 2017, [OSCURATO:PERSONA] v EUIPO — [OSCURATO:PERSONA] (bittorrent) (T‑771/15, not published, EU:T:2017:887), annul the decision of 31 August 2015 of the [OSCURATO:PERSONA] of Appeal in [OSCURATO:PERSONA] R 2275/2013-5 and dismiss the application for revocation brought by the intervener at first instance, or, in the alternative, set aside the judgment and refer the case back to the [OSCURATO:PERSONA]; –        order the other parties to the proceedings to pay the costs; –        order the original of the judgment in the application for revision of a judgment to be annexed to the original of the order under appeal and a note of the judgment in application for revision of a judgment to be made in the margin of the original of the order under appeal. 15 EUIPO contends that the [OSCURATO:PERSONA] should: –        dismiss the application for revision as inadmissible and –        order [OSCURATO:PERSONA] to pay the costs incurred by EUIPO. 16 [OSCURATO:PERSONA] contends that the [OSCURATO:PERSONA] should: –        dismiss the application for revision, and –        order [OSCURATO:PERSONA] to pay the costs The application for revision Arguments of the parties 17 [OSCURATO:PERSONA] raises two pleas in law in support of its application for revision. Those two pleas are based in the infringement of [OSCURATO:PERSONA] 181 of the Rules of Procedure, read together with [OSCURATO:PERSONA] 130(1) and [OSCURATO:PERSONA] 21(4) thereof and the infringement of [OSCURATO:PERSONA] 181 of that regulation, read together with [OSCURATO:PERSONA] 59, second sentence, of the Statute of the [OSCURATO:PERSONA] of [OSCURATO:PERSONA] of the [OSCURATO:PERSONA]. 18 By those pleas, [OSCURATO:PERSONA] essentially criticises the [OSCURATO:PERSONA] for incorrectly applying [OSCURATO:PERSONA] 181 of the Rules of Procedure, by not permitting the applicant itself and the parties concerned to intervene before the adoption of the order under appeal, or even allowing them to be heard before ruling without an oral procedure, and thereby to have violated the right to an effective remedy referred to in [OSCURATO:PERSONA] 47 of the Charter of [OSCURATO:PERSONA]. 19 More specifically, in its first plea, [OSCURATO:PERSONA] claims that the [OSCURATO:PERSONA] delivered the order under appeal before publishing in the [OSCURATO:PERSONA] of the [OSCURATO:PERSONA] the notice indicating the date of registration of the appeal brought by the applicant, in accordance with [OSCURATO:PERSONA] 21(4) of the Rules of Procedure, so that the interested parties did not have the opportunity to lodge an application for leave to intervene. According to [OSCURATO:PERSONA], since [OSCURATO:PERSONA] 130(1) of the Rules of Procedure provides that applications for leave to intervene must be submitted within six weeks of publication in the [OSCURATO:PERSONA] of the [OSCURATO:PERSONA] of the notice referred to in [OSCURATO:PERSONA] 21(4), the [OSCURATO:PERSONA] should have given a ruling after the expiry of that time limit, in order to enable the submission of applications for leave to intervene. It is only at that stage, if all the conditions were fulfilled, that [OSCURATO:PERSONA] 181 of the Rules of Procedure could have been applied. The order under appeal is therefore vitiated by a serious procedural error which undermined the right of the applicant, potential interveners, governments and the [OSCURATO:PERSONA] to be heard. 20 [OSCURATO:PERSONA], [OSCURATO:PERSONA] considers that the observations of potential interveners could have led the [OSCURATO:PERSONA] to make a different assessment of the facts in relation to the pleas relied on and to decide not to hold the appeal as being manifestly inadmissible and manifestly unfounded. [OSCURATO:PERSONA], [OSCURATO:PERSONA] states that it could have presented new evidence in its observations which would have supported the interpretation of the [OSCURATO:PERSONA] in the judgment of 19 December 2012, [OSCURATO:PERSONA] (C‑149/11, EU:C:2012:816), according to which genuine use in the territory of one [OSCURATO:PERSONA], namely [OSCURATO:PERSONA], is sufficient to justify preserving the rights over that mark. That new evidence included, inter alia, judgments of the Bundespatentgericht ([OSCURATO:PERSONA], [OSCURATO:PERSONA]) and EUIPO on one hand and, on the other hand, the judgment of the [OSCURATO:PERSONA] ([OSCURATO:PERSONA], [OSCURATO:PERSONA]) of 15 April 2015, impliedly confirmed by the judgment of the Bundesgerichtshof ([OSCURATO:PERSONA] of [OSCURATO:PERSONA]) of 29 June 2017. [OSCURATO:PERSONA] became aware of the first decisions after lodging the appeal before the [OSCURATO:PERSONA] while the second were known to the [OSCURATO:PERSONA] but were not taken into consideration in the reasoning of the order under appeal. 21 In support of the second plea, [OSCURATO:PERSONA] claims there is a ‘discrepancy’ between [OSCURATO:PERSONA] 181 of the Rules of Procedure and [OSCURATO:PERSONA] 59 of the Statute of the [OSCURATO:PERSONA] of [OSCURATO:PERSONA] of the [OSCURATO:PERSONA]. That discrepancy relates to the fact that the first provision allows an appeal to be dismissed as manifestly inadmissible or manifestly unfounded by reasoned order, after hearing the [OSCURATO:PERSONA], while the second provision must be interpreted as meaning that it also requires the parties to be heard before deciding to apply [OSCURATO:PERSONA] 181 of the Rules of Procedure. Neither the [OSCURATO:PERSONA] nor the applicant itself was aware of that discrepancy. 22 EUIPO and [OSCURATO:PERSONA] take the view that the application for revision must be dismissed as inadmissible. Findings of the [OSCURATO:PERSONA] 23 In accordance with [OSCURATO:PERSONA] 44 of the Statute of the [OSCURATO:PERSONA] of [OSCURATO:PERSONA] of the [OSCURATO:PERSONA] and [OSCURATO:PERSONA] 159(1) of the Rules of Procedure, the revision of a decision may be made only on discovery of a fact which is of such a nature as to be a decisive factor and which, when the judgment was delivered or the order served, was unknown to the [OSCURATO:PERSONA] and to the party claiming the revision 24 [OSCURATO:PERSONA], under [OSCURATO:PERSONA] 159(5) of the Rules of Procedure, without prejudice to its decision on the substance, the [OSCURATO:PERSONA], after hearing the [OSCURATO:PERSONA], must give in the form of an order its decision on the admissibility of the application, having regard to the written observations of the parties. 25 According to consistent case-law of the [OSCURATO:PERSONA] of [OSCURATO:PERSONA], revision is not an appeal procedure, but an exceptional review procedure that allows the authority of res judicata attaching to a final judgment or to an order made pursuant to [OSCURATO:PERSONA] 181 of the Rules of Procedure to be called into question on the basis of the findings of fact relied upon by the [OSCURATO:PERSONA]. Revision presupposes the discovery of elements of a factual nature which existed prior to the judgment or the order and which were unknown at that time to the [OSCURATO:PERSONA] which delivered the judgment or the order as well as to the party applying for revision and which, had the [OSCURATO:PERSONA] been able to take them into consideration, could have led it to a different determination of the proceedings (order of 11 December 2018, GX v [OSCURATO:PERSONA] , C‑233/17 P-REV, not published, EU:C:2018:1001, paragraph 19 and the case-law cited). 26 It follows that in the light of the exceptional nature of the revision procedure, the conditions governing the admissibility of an application for revision are to be interpreted strictly (judgment of 2 April 2009, Yedaş Tarim ve [OSCURATO:PERSONA] ve Ticaret v [OSCURATO:PERSONA] and [OSCURATO:PERSONA] , C‑255/06 P-REV, not published, EU:C:2009:212, paragraph 17). 27 In the present case, it must be held that the national and [OSCURATO:PERSONA] case-law to which [OSCURATO:PERSONA] refers does not constitute new unknown facts, within the meaning of [OSCURATO:PERSONA] 44 of the Statute of the [OSCURATO:PERSONA] of [OSCURATO:PERSONA] of the [OSCURATO:PERSONA], any more than the procedural infringements alleged by the latter, even assuming that they could have a decisive impact on the outcome of the dispute. 28 First of all, as far as concerns the provisions of the Statute and the Rules of Procedure and the judgment of the [OSCURATO:PERSONA] of 19 December 2012, [OSCURATO:PERSONA] (C‑149/11, EU:C:2012:816), not only do they not constitute new facts, but they must be considered to be well known by the [OSCURATO:PERSONA] (see, to that effect, judgment of 2 April 2009, Yedaş Tarim ve [OSCURATO:PERSONA] ve Ticaret v [OSCURATO:PERSONA] and [OSCURATO:PERSONA] , C‑255/06 P-REV, not published, EU:C:2009:212, paragraph 20). 29 Next, even if the national case-law concerning the genuine use of the [OSCURATO:PERSONA] mark, which was allegedly unknown to the [OSCURATO:PERSONA] and the applicant for revision, may be considered as a ‘fact’ within the meaning of [OSCURATO:PERSONA] 44 of the Statute of the [OSCURATO:PERSONA] of [OSCURATO:PERSONA] of the [OSCURATO:PERSONA], it suffices to observe that such case-law would not have led the [OSCURATO:PERSONA] to adopt a different outcome to the dispute. As set out in paragraph 21 of the order under appeal, the EU trade mark regime is an autonomous system, with its own set of objectives and rules peculiar to it, and it applies independently of any national system, which means that the EU Courts are not bound by decisions adopted in any [OSCURATO:PERSONA], those decisions constituting merely an element which, without being decisive, can only be taken into consideration for the purposes of the registration of an EU trade mark. 30 Finally, since, by its application for revision, [OSCURATO:PERSONA] seeks to have the contested order set aside on account of a ‘serious procedural error of crucial importance’, it must be recalled that, according to settled case-law, revision is not an appeal procedure, which can, in the absence of any new fact, call into question the legal assessments made by the [OSCURATO:PERSONA], which have the authority of res judicata (order of 11 December 2018, GX v [OSCURATO:PERSONA] , C‑233/17 P-REV, not published, EU:C:2018:1001, paragraph 22). 31 [OSCURATO:PERSONA] those circumstances, in accordance with [OSCURATO:PERSONA] 159(5) of the Rules of Procedure, the present application for revision must be dismissed as inadmissible. Costs 32 [OSCURATO:PERSONA] 138(1) of the Rules of Procedure, the unsuccessful party is to be ordered to pay the costs if they have been applied for in the successful party’s pleadings. Since EUIPO and [OSCURATO:PERSONA] have asked that [OSCURATO:PERSONA] be ordered to pay the costs and the latter has been unsuccessful, [OSCURATO:PERSONA] must be ordered to pay the costs. On those grounds, the [OSCURATO:PERSONA] ([OSCURATO:PERSONA]) hereby orders: 1. The application for revision brought by [OSCURATO:PERSONA] GmbH is dismissed. 2. [OSCURATO:PERSONA] GmbH is to pay the costs. Luxembourg, 8 May 2019. A. [OSCURATO:PERSONA] F. [OSCURATO:PERSONA] of the [OSCURATO:PERSONA] * Language of the case: English.