The long-running, multi-jurisdictional legal battle between crash game pioneer Spribe and Georgian gaming firm Aviator LLC has advanced with Spribe winning an injunction to prevent its opponent operating in the UK, at least temporarily.
Last week Spribe revealed that the UK High Court issued a verbal ruling preventing Aviator LLC from launching or marketing its own version of the Aviator crash game in the UK until the main court case can be heard.
While Spribe has hailed the decision as a huge success, Aviator LLC has shrugged off the decision, explaining that it could not launch without the relevant licences from the UK Gambling Commission which will take about 12 months to obtain.
Spribe founder David Natroshvili said: “I am pleased that the highly respected UK Court supports our position and has granted an injunction preventing Aviator LLC from launching and promoting its copycat game. Spribe created the Aviator crash game in 2018 and is the sole owner of the game globally. We will continue to take all necessary steps globally to protect Spribe, our partners and players from any third parties who seek to undermine or infringe our rights.”
However Nikoloz Gogilidze, Managing Partner of the law firm Mikadze Gegetchkori Taktakishvili LLC which represents Aviator LLC, responded: “Spribe has succeeded in securing an order preventing Aviator LLC from doing what it wasn’t doing anyway. A remarkable ‘victory’ indeed. The judge did not examine the merits of the case at all – other than deciding that Spribe’s claims met the low threshold of being arguable – or rule on whether Spribe is the rightful owner of the IP rights, despite Spribe’s attempts to suggest to industry otherwise.
“Aviator LLC remains committed to vigorously enforcing its intellectual property rights across all relevant jurisdictions and to recovering the assets and rights it contends were unlawfully appropriated by Spribe.”
‘Childlike and petulant’
Spribe also claimed that the court described Aviator LLC’s behaviour in hearings as ‘childlike’ and ‘petulant’, while Aviator LLC claimed that Spribe unsuccessfully sought gagging orders to prevent Aviator from using the name ‘Aviator’ referring to the game, or asserting its copyright ownership.
The legal battles between the two firms over the copyright of the Aviator brand have been running across multiple courts in multiple jurisdictions for over a year now in the UK, Georgia and European Union Intellectual Property Office. The dispute stems from the fact that Aviator LLC owner Teimuraz Ugulava used to own Georgian online casino Adjarabet and allowed the brand of its land-based casino Aviator to be used on the crash game. However when Flutter subsequently acquired Adjarabet, Aviator LLC claims it did not acquire the rights to use the Aviator brand.
Spribe said: “This activity by Aviator LLC forms part of a continuing chain of bad faith actions by Georgian businessman Temur Ugulava, who is behind Aviator LLC and a series of connected companies, aimed at exploiting the commercial success and international reputation of Spribe’s brand.”
It added: “Unfounded and opportunistic claims were launched in the Georgian courts last year by Aviator LLC, seeking to expropriate – for the territory of Georgia only – the Aviator branding and logo used by Spribe. The flawed Georgian ruling followed an unusually rapid and procedurally flawed legal process in a jurisdiction where concerns around judicial independence and transparency have been widely documented.
“Spribe continues firmly to reject these claims brought by Aviator LLC, which related solely to the use of a specific logo and branding in Georgia and did not concern ownership of the Aviator game itself.”
Bad faith
Gogilidze responded: “According to Spribe, the whole Georgian system must be both corrupt and unusually quick, since the decision has been upheld twice by three different courts including the Supreme Court of Georgia holding that Spribe has infringed copyright. In that case, the Supreme Court of Georgia upheld findings that Spribe’s crash game infringed Aviator’s copyright and that Spribe’s Georgian trademarks had been registered in bad faith. The UK claim is based on the same legal grounds: bad faith trade mark registration – albeit in respect of Spribe’s UK trade marks – and copyright infringement.”
The amazing success of the Aviator crash game – according to AI firm Blask the game still dominates igaming casino lobbies in Europe – means there is a lot at stake so the industry can expect more multi-jursidictional court action unless the two sides can somehow come to an arrangement. The current highly-charged communications between the two companies suggest such an outcome feels like a remote possibility at the moment.
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