Another controversy! South Korea's Coupang is investigated by police for selling counterfeit products

According to the Seoul Economic Daily, it is understood that Coupang, a South Korean e-commerce giant that just made its grand debut on the New York Stock Exchange this month with a total market value of 100 trillion won, is currently under investigation by the South Korean police.

Coupang was accused of violating trademark laws due to allegedly selling counterfeits of products made and sold by a small and medium-sized enterprise .

"Li Gui" hitches a ride on Coupang

South Korean industry insiders revealed on the 23rd that Lee, the representative of M Company, registered the trademark "MIAK (miak)" for the wireless earphone shell manufactured and sold by his company in June 2019 , and began to deliver the product to Coupang 's "rocket delivery" in June last year , with the delivery price being only about 50% of the actual consumer price . ( Rocket delivery is a way for Coupang to directly purchase the product itself and be responsible for the entire process of ordering, pricing, delivery, customer management, etc. )

But since Coupang launched the "Rocket Cooperation" service that can utilize Coupang's delivery service, Company M decided to sell related products in the "Rocket Cooperation" manner so that Company M can obtain more profits.

According to the schedule, the product should have been sold as "Rocket League" instead of "Rocket Delivery" starting from December last year , but the plan has not been approved by Coupang. According to the investigation, the reason is that another manufacturer, Company A, imitated the products of Company M, and Coupang continued to sell them under the name of Company M after purchasing the products of Company A.

According to Lee, Company A admitted that it had violated Company M's trademark rights, and Coupang also proposed a deal with Lee because it bought Company A's products without confirming that they were counterfeits and sold them as if they were Company M's products. In addition, Lee was asked to resume the transaction through "rocket delivery".

However, CEO Lee said he would continue the lawsuit and emphasized, “I hope to develop a plan to prevent the sale of counterfeit products. I heard that there are many other cases of trademark infringement. I hope to investigate the products in Coupang’s logistics warehouse.”

The trademark right of "miak" applied for registration by Mr. Li of M Company in June 2019. Image source: Seoul Economy

A Coupang official said: "The police are investigating and we are actively cooperating with the investigation. After Company M raised its objection, it immediately stopped selling the counterfeit product."

Coupang is a bit "inflated"

In fact, in addition to the above cases, there are constant disputes between Coupang and sellers. Earlier this month, Coupang also caused controversy by trying to seize the trademark rights of the "와우맘 (woommom)" brand of a small and medium-sized cosmetics company.

This is a trademark that was officially applied to the Patent Office in 2015, and cosmetics using this trademark are also sold through Coupang. However, Coupang asked the company to make a "decision to cancel the trademark rights", saying that Coupang would use the trademark rights. As the dispute continued, Coupang eventually gave up the request.

Although the incident has come to an end, it is still regarded as a representative example of the unreasonable arrogance of large companies towards small businesses. Coupang has recently been involved in a series of disputes over intellectual property rights of its sellers. As a giant in South Korea's e-commerce industry, Coupang should set an example and regulate the market order, rather than becoming arrogant and self-destructive before becoming the market leader.

Coupang

Infringement

trademark