The legal battle over the BBX name

If you were to choose a name of an important, new mobile operating system upon which you were pinning the future hopes of your beleaguered company, you would probably make sure you chose one that wouldn’t become the target of a lawsuit that could require you to change the name. You also wouldn’t be RIM, as its official @BlackBerryDev Twitter account has announced that the “BBX” name has been replaced by “BlackBerry 10.”

Shortly after the ruling came down, RIM’s tweet went up — and we now have a new name for RIM’s upcoming OS: BlackBerry 10.

RIM’s next-gen operating system, BBX, hasn’t had a very good run so far: co-CEO Mike Laziridius failed to give many details during BlackBerry DevCon, the PlayBook 2.0 OS on which it is based has been delayed until 2012, and now RIM is facing a lawsuit over the name itself.

The lawsuit comes from Basis International, which has used the “BBx” name to describe its own operating system since 1985 and also holds a trademark on the name. Three days after Basis complained directly to RIM about the term, it’s taken the complaint to a district court in New Mexico. Basis alleges that RIM’s use of the term infringes on its trademark. Trademark infringement generally requires that there be no “confusion” between marks, and Basis contends that since both refer to operating systems, this is a clear-cut case. In fact, Basis says that it has already fielded questions from customers about the confusion. For its part, RIM obviously disagrees — it responded to Basis’ original allegations last week in a statement given to Reuters:

Last week at BlackBerry DevCon, RIM unveiled the new name for its next-generation operating system, BBX. The very next day, it faced a potential lawsuit over the name from Basis, International — which has its own, trademarked operating system called “BBx.” Basis has sent a cease and desist letter to RIM asking the BlackBerry maker to stop using the name. In a press release, Basis CEO Nico Spence called attention to the fact that its BBx OS works on multiple platforms and is therefore concerned about customer confusion:

In the same press release, Spence may have extended an olive branch to RIM, noting that apps built for its BBx could potentially also work on BlackBerrys. RIM has expressed its intention to continue to use the BBX name, “We do not believe the marks are confusing.”