Being one of the busiest transit business cores in the world, the UAE has always been vulnerable to the ingress of counterfeit products. The nation has grown a firm administrative structure to combat this incursion of fake goods and is one of the sturdiest in the entire MENA region. Various local and international right holders are involved in active anti-counterfeiting activities in line with the Government’s severe steps to control the counterfeit products from setting foot in the markets. From our experience, we believe that the more the seizure, the higher is a right holder’s power over its brand in any country.
China continues to be the foremost global source of fake goods. After the pandemic, there has been an increase in the number of illegal shipments / containers arriving in the country. Therefore, our in-house market researchers are constantly monitoring warehouses and containers and suspicious traders, to detect potential cases for our clients, and search and seizure operations on fake goods are now being conducted on a more regular and continuous basis than before. These illegal traders have their own schemes and proclivities for various markets, but due to the unlawful character of their activities, these are hard to detect. They are inconsiderate to security and safety concerns, handling safe and unsafe goods commensurably.
The mobile phone industry is one of the industries which is excessively hit by the counterfeiting globally. The damage caused by counterfeiting, especially of products like fake cell phones and accessories is substantial. Not only do they raise serious legal concerns for brand manufacturers, and official distributors, but also pose significant health and life risks to consumers. Safety concerns originating from these fake goods give rise to tremendous obstructive notoriety impacts for producers of genuine goods, providing them a powerful motive to combat dangerous counterfeiters. Stopping these products from gaining access into the markets is one method to eliminate them. In the past couple of months, the authorities in the UAE, together with ATB, have seized more than 1 million fake mobile phones and accessories with an estimated value of more than AED 30 million. Among the items seized were counterfeit and refurbished handsets and huge quantity of replacement batteries, tablet cases, power banks, chargers, headphones, and screens. It is worth mentioning that counterfeit mobile phone producers copy all features of a branded phone’s appearance to make their items seem authentic. The phone’s outer shell and screen, the printed logos and branding, the packaging and the accessories can all be imitated, causing it hard to distinguish whether a phone is counterfeit or authentic. Even they often dwell-on pirated operating systems which have absent characteristics and the phones may not be consonant with connected software and applications.
ATB is deployed to safeguarding brand owners and consumers from fake goods by implementing efficacious measures as and when needed. Our operations usually commence either when we received intelligence from our trusted in-house sources or during our on-ground team’s customary market searches in the local markets. We then assist the right holders in filing the necessary complaint and subsequently accompany the authorities in conducting the seizure operations. Such cases are followed through by ATB’s in house lawyers until a final judgment for destruction is ordered by the court to ensure that these counterfeit products will be eliminated from the market.
Even though we have come a long way, it is a fact that these illegal counterfeiters will continue to evolve, and day by day they are developing more innovative ways to produce and hide their fake goods. Therefore, it is pertinent that brand owners, legal entities and authorities continue the initiatives, support, and patronage towards combating the illegal activities of the counterfeiters worldwide.
By: Binoosha Benoy, Intellectual Property Consultant
