[Exclusive] Court Issues First Ruling Defining "Internet General Merchandise Shopping Mall Business"... Cuckoo Mat Wins Suit Against Cuckoo Electronics

The Patent Trial and Appeal Board’s Decision Overturned by the Court
The Products a Business Handles, Not Its Size, Are the Basis for Classification

A court has ruled that even small businesses that sell or broker various types of goods through an internet platform should be classified as operating an “internet general shopping mall.”

This is the first ruling to set out in detail the concept of an “internet general shopping mall” under trademark law. It is expected to provide a foothold for small businesses that lack large capital or large-scale platforms to grow into general shopping malls.

Screenshot of the Cuckoo Mat website.

According to legal circles on October 8, the Fifth Division of the Patent Court, presided over by Judge Kim Jaeryeong, ruled in favor of the plaintiffs on September 15 in a lawsuit brought by Mr. Gu and Mr. Kim, the owners of the “Cuckoo Mat” trademark, against Cuckoo Homesys, an affiliate of Cuckoo Electronics. They had sought to have the Intellectual Property Trial and Appeal Board’s decision to cancel the trademark registration overturned.

The court first stated, “The essence of an ‘internet general shopping mall’ lies in ‘selling a variety of goods’ in a virtual marketplace on the internet, thereby enabling consumers to conveniently compare, select, and purchase products.” It added, “Therefore, it is difficult to conclude that an ‘internet general shopping mall’ must be limited to a shopping mall where multiple sellers set up shop.”

The court also found that “plaintiff Mr. Gu has sold various types of goods under the ‘Cuckoo Mat’ mark and used the trademark in advertisements on Naver Smartscore, the official shopping mall, a blog, and at the top of a YouTube channel, among other places.” It concluded, “The registered trademark in this case was legitimately used in Korea by Mr. Gu, one of the co-owners of the trademark rights, within the three years preceding the date the petition for trial was filed. It therefore is not subject to cancellation under the Trademark Act.”

The court concluded, “The decision rendered by the Intellectual Property Trial and Appeal Board in this case is hereby overturned.”

Cuckoo Mat is a registered trademark.

Mr. Gu registered the “Cuckoo Mat” trademark for the designated service of “internet general shopping mall” and sold various products, including mats, scratch remover, urinal deodorizer, and openers, through Naver Smart Store and his own official shopping mall.

In February 2024, however, Cuckoo Homesys, an affiliate of Cuckoo Electronics, which is known for its Cuckoo rice cookers, petitioned the Intellectual Property Trial and Appeal Board to cancel the trademark registration, targeting Mr. Gu and Mr. Kim, a co-owner of the trademark rights. It argued that the two had not used their registered trademark for the designated service of “internet general shopping mall” for more than three years.

In January 2026, the Intellectual Property Trial and Appeal Board accepted Cuckoo Homesys’ petition and ruled that the “Cuckoo Mat” trademark registered by Mr. Gu and others should be canceled.

The Board interpreted a “general shopping mall” as a commercial building, like a department store, where multiple independently operated retail stores are located together. It found that “internet general shopping mall” referred to operating a virtual general shopping mall through the internet or online. Applying this standard, it concluded that Mr. Gu’s sale of mats, cleaning products, household goods, and other items through a single online store, Naver Smart Store, could not be regarded as operating an internet general shopping mall.

Mr. Gu and Mr. Kim challenged the decision and filed a lawsuit with the Patent Court.

At trial, attorney Kim Dongjin of YK Law Firm, which represented Cuckoo Mat in the case, drew an analogy to the historical example of automobiles that emerged during the Industrial Revolution being judged by the same standards as horse-drawn carriages. He argued that, just as carriages and automobiles both transport people on wheels but differ entirely in their power sources and modes of transportation, new forms of online business should not be judged by standards designed for offline department stores and hypermarkets, which assume a physical space and a structure in which vendors set up shop.

He also highlighted that Amazon, the world’s largest commerce company, started as a small online bookstore and expanded the range of goods it handled before growing into a global general shopping mall. Attorney Kim, who joined YK this year after serving as a judge for 27 years, spent many years researching intellectual property rights, including trademarks, during his judicial career, including as a Supreme Court research judge.

The court accepted YK’s arguments. It rejected Cuckoo Homesys’ claim that an “internet general shopping mall” must “provide a service in which multiple sellers gather in one place and consumers can purchase a variety of goods.”

Instead, citing the Nice International Classification of Goods and Services of the World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO), among other sources, the court defined “internet general shopping mall” as “a business that operates a general shopping mall through an internet platform for consumers, directly selling or brokering the sale of various types of goods through third parties.”

The court found that the essence of “general” in a general shopping mall lies not in “multiple sellers” but in “the sale of a variety of goods,” and that the classification should be based on the goods and services handled rather than the scale of the business. The implication is that a business that has continued to sell various types of goods to consumers online cannot be excluded from the category of “internet general shopping mall” solely because it is small.

Attorney Kim Dongjin said, “In the online market, even a small business can expand its business by selling various products from other businesses alongside its own products.” He added, “This ruling is significant because it confirms that the actual way a business operates online should be considered, rather than the business’s size or outward appearance.”

He continued, “A small online business today can grow into a large business tomorrow. I hope this ruling will serve as an encouraging precedent for small businesses and entrepreneurs building their own brands.”

This content was produced with the assistance of AI translation services.