Continuation of the story with the Wargaming lawsuit against its former employees. Legal proceedings have begun in Cyprus. The defendant, an indie developer of the Blitz Team, may be banned from using his own name. From the lawsuit, Apple removed his game in European stores.
Background
In December, the Minsk developer Blitz Team reported on the personal claims of the “tank company” to its employees for a total of $1.69 million. In Belarus, at least 5 civil cases have been initiated against persons who worked for Wargaming before the Blitz Team.
The companies did not share the DAVA Framework/DAVA Engine technology. The Blitz Team believes that the project was open source until mid-2018. Wargaming insists that after 2014 the project is not open source, in 2018 it registered the rights to it and banned the distribution of later versions of the engine under an open BSD3 license.
A number of employees modified the engine before and after 2014. They are charged that at that time they illegally posted the modified engine code on GitHub, and since 2016 they have been creating new iterations under an open license.
The Blitz Team stated that these iterations were made with the permission of top Wargaming managers. The indie studio linked the lawsuits to the recent release of its first game, Battle Prime.
As it turned out, the title really does not have the last role in this story. After all, its name belongs to Wargaming too. In parallel, the company also appealed to the Nicosia District Court in the EU, since it is a resident of Cyprus. The trial ended not in favor of the Blitz Team.
Official Wargaming Position
In a press release for February 28, 2020, dedicated to this trial, Wargaming announced the following:
“The Wargaming company faced violations of intellectual property rights and other unfair actions on the part of Blitztim LLC and its former employees who participated in the development of World of Tanks Blitz, which led to the filing of lawsuits against various defendants, including Blitztim LLC. The company is filing such lawsuits for the first time in 20 years of its existence.
The principled position of Wargaming is to protect its own rights within the framework of current legislation in any jurisdictions where violations of rights occur. Protection measures are being taken, among other things, in order to prevent further unfair use by Blitztim LLC of intellectual property, the business reputation of Wargaming, as well as association with the World of Tanks Blitz product. To date, the Court of Nicosia, Cyprus, has issued rulings on the claim of Wargaming against OOO “Blitztime”: the defendant is prohibited from unauthorized use of the word “Blitz”, including the name Blitzteam LLC, the designations Blitz Team, Blitz Engine, and other similar names, designations and trademarks on the territory of the European Union in regarding video games. These court decisions have entered into force and are subject to immediate execution by the defendant. This injunction will be notified to the Google Play and App Store platforms, which host the products of Blitztim LLC.
(…)
Currently, courts outside the Republic of Belarus are preparing to file other lawsuits of the Wargaming company against OOO “Blitztime” and related persons on the facts of illegal use of the intellectual property of the Wargaming company and unfair actions. Wargaming does not comment on the information about the course of the processes and all the circumstances that served as the basis for them until the moment of making decisions.”
Note: earlier, the Blitz Team was perplexed whether Wargaming’s claims apply only to them or to all the authors of the DAVA Framework/DAVA Engine modifications.
Blitz Team’s Response
We have requested a comment from the Minsk Blitz Team. The studio claims that it learned about the trial and its results retroactively.
“Last week, our Battle Prime mobile game took second place in the App Store in the UK, Germany, France and Italy in the Adrenaline Rush nomination.
This week Apple informed us that, at the request of Wargaming, Apple is forced to suspend the distribution of our Battle Prime game in the countries of the European Union. We respect Apple’s decision.
We have lost all positions in the EU not because there is something wrong with the game or its code, but for reasons that are not very clear – for example, because our Belarusian company is called Blitztim LLC. Wargaming considered that our use of the word “Blitz” violates their rights, including the trademarks “World of Tanks Blitz”, “World of Warships Blitz“. At the request of Wargaming, the Nicosia District Court issued an interim order stating that we are prohibited from using the word “Blitz” in the EU in the name, signs, etc. when distributing video games.
We have completely different games, and we could probably explain that “Blitz” is not the word that makes Wargaming trademarks recognizable and distinguishes them from others. But we were not invited to the Cyprus court.
We learned that the trial took place in Cyprus from the Wargaming press release. Then we received by e-mail the ruling of the Cyprus court and the Wargaming statement — 48 documents with all appendices, about 280 pages in Greek and English. We still can’t read it all and understand it. It seems that Wargaming was preparing (for trial) all January and February, while we naively waited for her documents in the Supreme Court of Belarus, where she filed 5 lawsuits against our employees.
From these Cyprus documents, we learned the following: Wargaming has registered the name of our only game, Battle Prime.
Here are the facts:
20.05.2019. LLC “Blitztime” bought a domain name BattlePrime.com . to post info about the Battle Prime game.
24.05.2019. We have submitted an application to the NCIS of Belarus for registration of the Battle Prime trademark (application number 20191204).
13.06.2019. Wargaming.net Limited, as a resident of Cyprus, i.e. an EU member state, has submitted an application for registration of the Battle Prime trademark to the European Intellectual Property Office (EUIPO).
05.11.2019. Battle Prime trademark registration has been obtained for Wargaming.net Limited on the territory of the EU.
21.01.2020. Battle Prime registration has been received for Blitztime LLC in the NCIS of Belarus. The information in the NCIS database has not yet appeared. But there is a paper certificate of registration.
An amazing thing. The Cyprus trademark registration authority worked faster than the Belarusian one, although we had submitted an application earlier. We were left without a trademark in the EU for our only game, in which we invested all our funds. We are waiting for new lawsuits in Cyprus — about the illegal use of Battle Prime.
Nothing has been proven in the courts yet, and Wargaming is already writing in the media that it has faced unfair actions on our part and violation of its rights. We want people to know the truth. Serfdom was abolished long ago, we have not violated any other rights of Wargaming.
1. We did not take someone else’s — the WG engine. And we are responsible for these words. We have written our own, new engine. We don’t need to take anything from anyone: we make this code with our own hands, unlike the “bosses” from the WG. And we are ready to prove it in court, where people listen — in the Supreme Court of the Republic of Belarus.
2. We believe that the name of our company violates the rights of Wargaming no more than the names of games of all other famous studios that are quietly published in the App Store (Bingo Blitz from Playtika, Bejeweled Blitz and Tetris Blitz from EA, Disney Emoji Blitz from Disney, etc.). Wargaming does not file complaints against them and writes a disclaimer in its press releases that its actions concern only us (apparently, it does not want a counterclaim from the “big ones”, we understand).
3. The only thing we are “guilty of” is that we left Wargaming and dared to create a successful startup. We made a great game — Battle Prime. We want to develop our company in our country.
Wargaming has already paid about 80 thousand euros of state duty for filing lawsuits against our employees to the Supreme Court of the Republic of Belarus and 100 thousand euros to the deposit of the Nicosia District Court. We perceive as a real threat and pressure the statements made by them in the press that Wargaming is preparing new lawsuits against us in foreign courts. Unfortunately, inequality in money can also lead to inequality in the courts, even when you are right. We think Wargaming understands that we simply do not have enough money to come to all overseas courts, pay expensive foreign lawyers and challenge all interim orders; as a result, we will not be able to protect our rights. Even on your own Battle Prime. It’s not fair.
Wargaming could “act like a man” – file all the lawsuits they want in the Belarusian courts. This would make our chances equal, and the budget of our Homeland would receive another indirect effect from the development of HTP — hundreds of thousands (euros) of state duty.”
Regarding the trial, which, according to the Blitz Team, took place in her absence, the developer’s lawyer Denis Aleynikov spoke as follows:
“According to the procedural rules of Cyprus, such a procedure is allowed only in cases where there is an urgent need to protect and ensure the interests of the applicant. LLC Blitztim has been operating since 2018. In such circumstances, it is not yet clear what the urgency was and why such a radical interim measure was requested from the court. Taking into account the consequences that have arisen at the present time, Blitztim LLC will be forced to appeal this judicial act in accordance with the established procedure.”
You can read more about the situation with the DAVA Engine here and here.
Also on the topic:
- Wargaming sued former employees. She demands $1.69 million from them.
- Wargaming has confirmed the existence of lawsuits against former employees
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