Huawei is in a position to get Apple to write it a big check over the Vision Pro

Apple might be forced to change the name of its $3,499 Vision Pro spatial computer in China. That's because Huawei was given the "Vision Pro" trademark in China on May 16, 2019. Huawei’s Vision Pro trademark is listed under registration number 38242888 and it gives the company the exclusive rights to use the trademark from November 28, 2021, to November 27, 2031.

The news, which came from MyDrivers (via HuaweiCentral) points out that this isn't something that Huawei did on purpose to hurt Apple as the company already has a line of products under the Vision name including smart glasses and smart televisions. And since these products were released well before the Vision Pro will be advertised in China, it will be Apple that will be forced to change the name of the Vision Pro in China unless it can agree to a deal with Huawei. The Vision Pro will be released early next year only in the U.S.

This wouldn't be the first time Apple found itself in this situation. In 2012 Apple ended up paying a company called Proview $60 million to use the iPad name in China. That turned out to be a decent deal for Apple when you consider that Proview was originally asking for $2 billion for the rights to the name. In that case, Apple had previously purchased the rights to the name from Proview's Taiwan office but that did not include the rights to the iPad name in mainland China. That faux pas cost Apple $60 million.

And on February 21st, 2007, nearly six weeks after the iPhone was unveiled by the late Steve Jobs, the company paid Cisco a sum estimated to be between $25 million and $50 million to use the iPhone name. For that "investment," both Apple and Cisco agreed to allow each company to call their respective products iPhone, and all pending lawsuits were dismissed. Cisco obtained the iPhone trademark when it acquired infoGear in 2000. The latter had trademarked the name in 1996.

Cisco filed a suit on January 10th, 2007, the day after Steve Jobs and Apple introduced the touchscreen smartphone. Interestingly, infoGear's iPhone was a desktop phone  that had an internet browser built-in, could send and receive email, and also was a digital answering machine.