After losing a trademark infringement lawsuit, Microsoft will have to rename its SkyDrive cloud storage service, according to PCWorld. In 2011, U.K. broadcaster British Sky Broadcasting (BSkyB) alleged that SkyDrive was infringing upon the “Sky” portion of its name in a lawsuit filed on its behalf in the English High Court. Microsoft was unable to defend the SkyDrive name, losing the case and an appeal in June.
“We’re glad to have resolution of this naming dispute, and will continue to deliver the great service our hundreds of millions of customers expect, providing the best way to always have your files with you,” read a statement released by Microsoft.
Microsoft will continue to use the SkyDrive name until it can decide upon and transition to a new one. The name change will be costly for Microsoft. In particular, its promotional materials, which have increasingly focused on SkyDrive as the glue that holds its various software services together, will have to be completely reimagined.
In addition, this comes on the heels of Microsoft having a trademark infringement suit filed against it by Metro AG, a German company, because of its “Metro” design schema within Windows 8. In that case, Microsoft was able to rebrand quickly by replacing the use of the term “Metro” with either “Modern” or just “Windows 8.”
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