Influencer ordered to pay TWD700,000 in damages for launching luxury watch group-buy campaign without authorization

　A Taiwanese influencer, SHIH Shu-Hua (hereinafter “Shih”) was sued by Omega SA for launching a group-buy campaign for OMEGA watches on his FB fan pages and group-buy website and claiming his partnership with “OMEGA, a Swiss luxury brand with a 160-year history”.  The IPC Court rendered a judgment ordering Shih to pay TWD500,000 in damages in the first-instance proceedings.  On Shih’s appeal, the court revised the judgment, increasing the damages to TWD700,000 and ordering Shih to publish a notice regarding the judgment in favor of Omega on his FB fan pages for 30 days.  

　In April 2023, for this campaign, Shih emphasized on his FB fan pages that he the watches were offered at super VVIP prices and could be picked up at physical retail counters and were definitely not parallel imports.  After learning of such a campaign, Omega initiated an investigation, finding that Shih was simply a VIP customer of the brand at its department-store counter in Taiwan and he had once made bulk purchases of watches during promotional periods and requested that company invoices be issued for the purchases.  It was further confirmed in the investigation that there was no business partnership or authorization between Shih and Omega.  
　　
　Omega alleged that Shih engaged in commercial activities by falsely claiming his business partnership with Omega with an aim to profiting from the resale of its products or credit card rewards, which misled consumers into believing that there was a sponsorship or authorization relationship between Shih and Omega and thus led to infringement upon Omega’s trademark rights and goodwill.  In this regard, Omega filed a lawsuit alleging Shih’s violations of the Trademark Act and Fair Trade Act.  

　After hearing this case in the first-instance proceedings, the IPC Court found that Shih’s promotional materials indeed caused consumers to mistakenly believe that Shih was authorized by Omega and thus harmed the reputation of Omega’s trademark, and therefore, prohibited Shih from using the “OMEGA+Ω” mark in online stores, advertisements, digital audio-visual contents, electronic media, the Internet, or any other media, and ordered Shih to remove and destroy all signs, advertisements and other marketing materials containing the “OMEGA+Ω” mark.  Moreover, Shih was ordered to pay TWD500,000 in damages.  Upon both sides’ appeals, the second-instance court upheld the TWD500,000 award and further awarded TWD200,000 in damages, bringing the total amount payable by Shih to TWD700,000.  Shih was also ordered to publish a notice regarding Omega’s victory in this lawsuit on its two FB pages for 30 consecutive days.  This case remains subject to further appeal.  (Released 2026.05.22)  
/CCS