Decisions · 86046590
In re Change Wind Corp.
Serial No. 86046590 · Decided 2017-07-20 · Other
What happened
The Board refused Change Wind Corp.'s application to register the three-dimensional shape of its vertical-axis wind turbine — four twisting wings straddling a cone-topped cylindrical tower — for wind turbines and wind-powered electricity generators, because the company’s own utility patent showed the shape is essential to how the turbine works and its sales and advertising evidence did not prove that buyers recognize the shape as a brand.
The marks
Applicant
Three-dimensional product configuration of a wind-powered turbine: four vertically extending turbine wings, obliquely curved in a twisting (helical) manner, straddling a vertically extending cylindrical base that tapers at its upper end into a truncated cone (design-only configuration mark; Section 2(f) claimed)
"Wind turbines; Wind-powered electricity generators" in Class 7
Why this decision is significant
Precedential and regularly cited functionality authority: a utility patent’s specification disclosures (not just its claims) can establish Section 2(e)(5) functionality, and the drawing controls what the mark is — solid-line features count; cited by two decisions in this database.
Research significance is Trademark Valet's editorial rating of how useful a decision is to practitioners. It is not a statement of precedential weight — that is the separate Precedential field, which comes from the Board.
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The original record
Read the opinion and every filing on the Board's own docket. The summary above is our paraphrase, not a quotation from the opinion. The opinion is the authority.
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