The scourge of counterfeit watches and blatant robbery of real craftsmen’s creativity is going to diminish significantly for a number of Richemont brands following an uncontested judgement made in the New York federal court.
A number of Richemont brands have won lawsuits against counterfeit watch websites in a $100 million (£62m) ruling.
Scores of counterfeit watch sites blatantly hawking replicas of well known brands such as sites Cartier, Panerai, Roger Dubuis, A Lange & Sohne and Alfred Dunhill sued the site owners in August of last year through the New York Federal Court for counterfeiting infringement, cyber-squatting, and trademark dilution.
Without a leg to stand on, the sites failed to defend the brand’s complaints, so by default judgement was passed on January 4th.
It’s going to be a chilly start to 2013 for many counterfeiters. However, it remains to be seen whether a new batch of websites retailing the same fake goods simply pop up in their place.
