Gradiente had applied for exclusive rights to the name iPhone in Brazil in 2000.
FORBES: Apple Fights For The Right To Call iPhone An iPhone In Brazil
The Brazilian company launched its latest G-Gradiente iPhone just 15 days before its patent rights expired.
Regardless, now that Gradiente Eletronica officially owns the name, it can choose to do whatever it wants.
But the decision means that Gradiente has an option of suing for exclusivity in South America's biggest market.
Where the Goophone had a modicum of branding tact, Gradiente's waving paperwork.
ENGADGET: New 'iphone' launches in Brazil, lawyers cancel Christmas break
Gradiente explained it held back on releasing its own iphone until recently as it concluded corporate restructuring from 2008.
Gradiente won the rights to trademark iPhone as its own brand back in 2008 after a long 8 year process.
Gradiente claims that it had foreseen the revolution of smartphones in 2000 long before Steve Jobs ever dreamed of iPhone.
FORBES: Apple Fights For The Right To Call iPhone An iPhone In Brazil
The ruling is the result of a local company, Gradiente Eletronica, registering the name in 2000, six years before the US firm.
Gradiente did not start using the iphone trademark until last year, 2012.
It took INPI seven years before they granted IGB the right to trademark the name and that year the G-Gradiente iPhone was launched.
Last week, Gradiente SA started selling smartphones with the iPhone brand after winning the legal right to use the name in Brazil.
The new iphone has launched in Brazil, but no, we're not talking about Apple's flagship -- we mean the bravely titled Gradiente iphone Neo One.
ENGADGET: New 'iphone' launches in Brazil, lawyers cancel Christmas break
As Apple started its applications for iPhone in 2006, they were denied because Gradiente had a very similar register for cell phones applied some years before the American company.
Apple is asking the INPI to cancel Gradiente's registration through expiration - it is arguing that the Brazilian firm did not use the name within a five year limit.
"IPHONE" was filed for trademark registration in Brazil in 2000, and although Apple started offering its handset in the country in 2007, Gradiente scored exclusive rights to the name in 2008.
ENGADGET: New 'iphone' launches in Brazil, lawyers cancel Christmas break
Apple may wonder why the firm waited so long to launch its first device (Gradiente Eletronica claims a multi-year restructuring forced the company to delay the product), which was released last year.
And in a twist on timing that Apple hopes may help it win branding rights, Gradiente Eletronica only launched its first "iphone", the iphone Neo One, in December 2012 -- five years after Apple debuted its inaugural iPhone.
应用推荐