On Dec 21, 2020, the Supreme People's Court of China (SPC) made a final ruling in "RedBull" trademark disputes between (Beijing) RedBull Vitamin Beverage Co., Ltd. and (Thailand) T.C. Pharmaceutical Industries Co., Ltd.
The SPC dismissed the appeal of Beijing RedBull and upheld the first instance judgment made by the Beijing Higher People's Court on November 25, 2019, by confirming that (Thailand) T.C. Pharmaceutical Industries has independent and complete ownership of the series of "RedBull" trademarks. This case caught a lot of attention due to its astronomical damage amount of RMB 3.753 billion (USD 577 million) as claimed by Beijing RedBull and the RMB 18.8 million (USD2.89 million) court fee.
The SPC stated that the ownership of the series of "RedBull" trademarks is clear, and the use of "RedBull" trademarks by Beijing RedBull is based on the license, instead of assignment, of the RedBull trademarks by (Thailand) T.C. Pharmaceutical Industries. Beijing RedBull claims that as the actual user of the trademarks, it has made a great contribution to the improvement of the trademark's goodwill and designed some of these trademarks but this was rejected by the SPC.
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