Burger King and its Russian partners pushed back the launch of the fast food chain in Russia, citing difficulties in regaining ownership of the brand's domain name in Russia, according to Kommersant, a daily business newspaper.

Burger King Corporation filed a lawsuit against a Scandinavian company, which owns the domain name burgerking.ru. According to Kommersant, Burger King is likely to win the case, given that Russian law supports the rights of the owners of registered trademarks. Burger King Corporation registered its trademark in Russia back in 1994 but failed to register the domain name in this country. The company refused to buy the domain name from its present owners and hopes to obtain the ownership in court.

The fast food chain signed a franchise agreement with Shokoladnitza, one of the largest coffee shop chains operators in the country, and was expected to open its first location in Moscow this year. Now, the estimated launch date is pushed back to 2010.

This is not the first time that trademark and web squatters take domain names and trademarks hostage and demand large payments for giving them up. In 2007, Starbucks launched in Russia three-year legal battle with a Russian company which registered the "Starbucks" trademark and barred the Seattle-based company from the Russian market. Starbucks prevailed in court and now has 26 locations in Moscow.

Source: Fake Hamburger [Kommersant -- in Russian]

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