Groopon vs. Scoopon: battle for domainon.com.au

After reading a fresh topic about Google’s google.ua domain, I decided to talk about the outcome of a similar dispute in the “mirror” domain au.

Chronology of events

• 2006. The brothers Hezi and Gabi Leibovich launch their project Catch of The Day , on which some goods are sold every day with a significant discount.
• November, 2008. Groupon, led by Andy Mason, begins work on the Chicago market and very quickly becomes one of the hottest Internet companies.
• April, 2010. Catch of The Day launches a Groupon substitute called Scoopon for the Australian market. At about the same time, the Leibovich brothers register Groupon Pty Ltd, the GROUPON trademark and the domain groupon.com.au.
• August, 2010. Groupon filed a lawsuit in the Federal Court of Victoria (Australia), trying to select the trademark and domain groupon.com.au.
• October, 2010. It is becoming known that Groupon also sued the state of Illinois against the owners of Scoopon, arguing that they misuse Groupon's intellectual property and are detrimental to the company's business.
• January, 2011. Andy Mason writes a post in the official Groupon blog “ Why Groupon is not in Australia, ” in which (besides the unflattering feedback about brothers Leibovich) mentions that he tried to negotiate the purchase of a domain and TM for $ 289,000, but the deal was lost due to the fault of the sellers . The comments from Scoopon that appeared later as the reason for the breakdown of the deal mentioned additional conditions unacceptable for the Leibovich brothers, which the American company insisted on
• February-July, 2011. The parties are suing in the USA and Australia, I have not received any final decision on my publications.
• July 2011. It became known that Groopon nevertheless agreed with the owners of Scoopon and received trademarks and domain names. The amount of the transaction was not disclosed.

In the documents of the American case according to the Sydney Morning Herald information, Hezy Leibovich argued that the registration of the domain and the TM on their part was a completely legitimate protective move to create an obstacle for the transnational competitor to enter the Australian market. The domain was not used for business and, upon request, gave (and still produces) an error message.
It is also worth noting that Scoopon is one of the market leaders group buying in Australia with hundreds of thousands of customers.

Conclusions (not claiming originality)

• In different countries, domain disputes end differently.
• Probably still do without a court and agree ultimately profitable
• It matters who the respondent is and how the disputed domain is used.
• If you are planning to build an international business, do not click ... attend to the purchase of domains in the markets of potential interest to you in advance