I told you that Cisco had given a second extension to Apple over iPhone and an out of court settlement seemed a possibility and I was probably right. GigaOm reports that both the companies have released a statement that they have reached an agreement over the most sought after iPhone trademark.
Given below is an excerpt from the statement:
Under the agreement, both companies are free to use the "iPhone" trademark on their products throughout the world. Both companies acknowledge the trademark ownership rights that have been granted, and each side will dismiss any pending actions regarding the trademark. In addition, Cisco and Apple will explore opportunities for interoperability in the areas of security, and consumer and enterprise communications. Other terms of the agreement are confidential.
This rather concise statement states that both the companies could use the trademark worldwide and both of them would be dismissing any suits against each other on the trademark issue. The other terms of the agreement have been kept confidential, probably loads of money must have exchanged hands and they would like to keep mum on this issue otherwise you might see courts being flooded with trademark infringement cases. For Apple it's certainly a victory as its existing products too come with the 'i' mark and it would have wanted to continue with the trend because its iPhone was one of the most awaited phones and people had already started associating iPhone with Appple without even realizing that Cisco held the rights to it. I feel Cisco did the right thing to reach an out of court settlement because even if it won the suit it would have been a lost battle for it since the name apple iphone was already etched in the minds of the people.
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Basically, Cisco wants Apple to use their networking products as much as possible.
Cisco might as well just sell the entire right of using iphone to apple.
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