This case has been cited 2 times or more.
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2014-09-10 |
PERLAS-BERNABE, J. |
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| Unfair competition is defined as the passing off (or palming off) or attempting to pass off upon the public of the goods or business of one person as the goods or business of another with the end and probable effect of deceiving the public. This takes place where the defendant gives his goods the general appearance of the goods of his competitor with the intention of deceiving the public that the goods are those of his competitor.[18] | |||||
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2014-07-21 |
PERLAS-BERNABE, J. |
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| The statutory attribution of the unfair competition concept is well-supplemented by jurisprudential pronouncements. In the recent case of Republic Gas Corporation v. Petron Corporation,[25] the Court has echoed the classic definition of the term which is "'the passing off (or palming off) or attempting to pass off upon the public of the goods or business of one person as the goods or business of another with the end and probable effect of deceiving the public.' Passing off (or palming off) takes place where the defendant, by imitative devices on the general appearance of the goods, misleads prospective purchasers into buying his merchandise under the impression that they are buying that of his competitors. [In other words], the defendant gives his goods the general appearance of the goods of his competitor with the intention of deceiving the public that the goods are those of his competitor."[26] The "true test" of unfair competition has thus been "whether the acts of the defendant have the intent of deceiving or are calculated to deceive the ordinary buyer making his purchases under the ordinary conditions of the particular trade to which the controversy relates." Based on the foregoing, it is therefore essential to prove the existence of fraud, or the intent to deceive, actual or probable,[27] determined through a judicious scrutiny of the factual circumstances attendant to a particular case.[28] | |||||