Katy Perry loses trademark case against Katie Perry after 16-year legal battle
Singer Katy Perry may have to finally call it a day after the latest ruling in her ongoing legal battle with Australian designer Katie Perry.
The legal feud between pop singer Katy Perry and Australian fashion designer Katie Perry goes back quite a while at this point.
Sydney-based Katie Taylor, whose maiden name is Perry, registered her business name Katie Perry way back in 2007, and applied for a trademark.
Because she originally filed the trademark in the wrong category and forgot to pay the fee, she didn't have a trademark for Katie Perry under clothes until September 29 2008.
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Taylor sold clothes at local markets, had a website and multiple social media accounts with the Katie Perry brand.
But around the same time, singer Katy Perry grew in popularity. Her breakthrough single 'I Kissed a Girl' dropped on April 28 2008 and has been inescapable ever since.
Taylor said she bought the song on iTunes 'because she wanted to support an artist who had the same name as her'... little did she know what was about to follow.
In 2009, she received a letter from Perry's lawyers.
Taylor told CNN: "All I remember is looking at this paper that said, cease and desist. Stop sale of your clothes, stop any website, and stop any advertising material.
"I remember, bursting into tears and thinking, what is this all about? I haven’t done anything wrong."
'Dumb b***h! Rawr!'
On the other side of the battle lines, emails from Perry to her team from 2009 - which were included in legal documents - reveal her frustration at the media attention from the trademark battle.
Her manager Steven Jenson said the issue 'has been blown way out of proportion', adding that Perry had 'not tried to keep [Taylor] from trading under her name, and have certainly not sued her for trademark infringement'.
After Jensen suggested they release a statement attributed to Perry, the singer opposed the idea, telling him to 'release something from management, pretty much stating the facts'.
She added: "Stupid b****es. I wouldn't have even bothered with this [if] mtv hadn't picked up this silliness. Dumb b***h! Rawr!"
Perry's team said they offered Taylor a coexistence agreement, which Taylor declined, and then dropped their opposition to Taylor's trademark, but that was far from the end of the story.
In 2019, Taylor sued the pop star for trademark infringement for the singer's sale of jackets, hoodies, T-shirts and sweatpants during a 2014 tour, claiming a breach of trademark laws.
What followed is a complex series of legal victories and reversals.
In 2023 Taylor won, but in 2024 it was overturned following an appeal from the singer.
In 2026, on March 11, Australia’s high court found that Katie Perry had not hurt the US singer's reputation or caused confusion with her clothing brand.
Why Katie Perry won the trademark case against Katy Perry
This new decision by judges found that Perry's reputation was so well-established in Australia that anyone seeing Taylor's clothing brand would not confuse the two names.
Justice Simon Steward said Jensen 'gave evidence at trial that since then he had not become aware of any cases of confusion', ABC News reports.
He rejected the argument by Perry’s lawyers that the singer had already acquired a significant reputation in Australia when Taylor applied for her trademark in 2008, adding that this didn’t extend to clothing.
He described Perry's team as acting as 'a persistent or assiduous infringer of the appellant's validly registered 'Katie Perry' mark'.
It has 'never just been about a name'
Following the decision, the designer Katie Perry said: “This has been an incredibly long and difficult journey.
"But today confirms what I always believed - that trademarks should protect businesses of all sizes.
"This case has never just been about a name. It has been about protecting small businesses in Australia, for standing up for what is right and showing that we all matter."
She told A Current Affair: "It's just taken up so much of my life and I can't believe I've won."
She said part of the reason she took Perry to court was to set a good example for her children.
She added: "I know I've set that really good role model for them of resilience, of standing up to bullies, of backing yourself as well."
A representative for the pop singer said in a statement to LADbible Group: "Katy Perry has never sought to close down Ms. Taylor’s business or stop her selling clothes under the KATIE PERRY label.
"Today, by a 3:2 decision, the High Court determined that Ms. Taylor’s trademark can remain on the register. The Court sent the case back to the Full Federal Court to determine issues raised by Katy Perry, including Ms. Taylor’s 10-year delay in bringing her case against Katy Perry."
Topics: News, Celebrity, Australia, Music, Katy Perry
Gerrard Kaonga