Cisco Systems Inc. has owned the name “iPhone” since 2000 and today announced that it is suing Apple Inc. in federal court. Cisco obtained the trademark by acquiring InfoGear Technology Corp. over 6 years ago, which originally registered the name. It has been three weeks since Cisco’s Linksys division released a Voice over Internet Protocol (VoIP) phone for which the trademark was put to use. Apple had tried to gain legal rights to use the iPhone name but upon failure chose to unveil their iPhone yesterday anyway, a touch-screen cell phone with music, video, web, voicemail and e-mail capabilities.

“Cisco entered into negotiations with Apple in good faith after Apple repeatedly asked permission to use Cisco’s iPhone name. There is no doubt that Apple’s new phone is very exciting, but they should not be using our trademark without our permission.” said Mark Chandler, Cisco senior vice president and general counsel.

View: Linksys iPhone | Apple iPhone
Source: Breitbart via Neowin