Landing Holdings Group has applied for registrations of several “Landing” trademarks in several classes. In 2015, the applicant applied for registration of the trademark in the designated classes of service before the Trademark Office (TMO). The TMO rejected the application on the ground that the trademark was similar to a cited trademark previously registered by another person in the same or similar class of service. The applicant then applied for review before the Trademark Review and Adjudication Board (TRAB), and the TRAB sustained the TMO’s decision.

Upon acceptance of the entrustment of the Client, Chen Lei and You Zhongzheng of ZhongYin (Hefei), after studying the case carefully, proposed two important options. On the one hand, they applied for cancellation of the cited trademark before the TMO on the ground that it had not been used for three years. On the other hand, they file an administrative lawsuit against the TRAB before Beijing Intellectual Property Court. Beijing Intellectual Property Court sustained the TRAB’s decision in the first instance judgment. The plaintiff refused to accept the first-instance judgment and appealed before Beijing Higher People’s Court. During the trial in the second instance before the Beijing Higher People's Court, the TMO cancelled the registration of the cited trademark in certain classes based on the grounds in the applicant’s previous application for cancellation. At this point, the case was turned around: the prior registration right of the third-party blocking the client’s registration is cleared. Thus, Beijing Higher People’s Court ruled that the first-instance judgment and the decision of the TRAB shall be cancelled, and the TRAB shall make a new decision accordingly.