Many U.S. trademark owners have successfully relied on Article 6bis of the Paris Convention in order to protect their famous trademark from piracy abroad.  The U.S., in my view, sometimes grants a narrower scope of protection than other countries in situations where it is obvious the U.S. applicant has adopted a non-US company’s trademark (see Person’s v. Christman, 900 F.2d 1565 (Fed. Cir. 1990).

This Asia Times article alleges that a U.S. company has filed a piractical U.S. trademark application consisting of the logo of PetroVietnam, a large Vietnamese oil company.    More coverage here.  Interestingly, the U.S. applicant alleges use of the logo here since 1991.

The article indicates that there is a bi-lateral agreement beween the U.S. and Vietnam covering the protection of IP.  If we see litigation, this also looks like an opportunity to re-visit the U.S. scope of 6bis.