A while ago, a dispute between an artist and a toy company that produced “Angry Birds” merchandise came to light, in which the artist claimed that she was inappropriately compensated for her work on designing toys for the manufacturer, and she was cheated out of potentially millions of dollars realized through merchandise sales of “Angry Birds” toys. After the artist’s initial filing of the lawsuit, the toy company Hartz Mountain Corp filed a motion to dismiss. On Monday, that motion was denied, and the lawsuit was allowed to move forward.
According to the company’s stance, they own the trademark for “Angry Birds” and their license also covers the work produced by the artist. On the other hand, the artist, Juli Adams, claimed that the “Angry Birds” logo was part of the intellectual property which had been licensed to Hartz Mountain.
Hartz initially had a five-year license agreement with the artist for her design of a line of plush toys, but subsequently, the company got involved in a deal with Rovio, developer of the “Angry Birds” mobile games, which led to a conflict of interest. At this point, Hartz reportedly completely dropped their support for the artist’s products, and focused on their newly acquired “Angry Birds” line instead, violating their agreement with the artist.
The company attempted to defend their position by claiming that their agreement with the artist wasn’t actually eligible for consideration as a valid trademark license, as it didn’t specifically mention the trademark “Angry Birds”, and lacked quality control provisions. With that in mind, the company believed that they were under no obligation to provide an exclusive deal to Adams.
It’s not clear if the company’s position on this is correct, however the recent denial of their motion to dismiss certainly makes things interesting, and it would be curious to see where the ordeal ends up. At this point, none of the parties involved have made any public comments regarding the case. This also includes Rovio, who seem to have found themselves in the middle of this crossfire without actually intending to. It’s not known if the fallout from the case is going to affect the game developer as well, although it’s not unlikely, in the least through a blow to their reputation by association.
Rovio have been quite active in licensing their successful brand to a variety of companies, including for a film that’s scheduled for release in May 2016. Some industry commenters have noted that such a move seems strange, and there’s not that much potential for a successful movie based on the game, while others have been more positive, and have actually expressed an interest in seeing characters from the game on screen.