MGT Capital Investments Inc. (OTCMKTS:MGTI) approached the court recently, to request for a preliminary order to curtail the sale of Intel security, McAfee. The company approached the United States District Court located in the Southern District of New York and urged it, through the judicial filing, to issue preliminary injunction. The order, company said, was proposed to curtail Intel from trading, selling, leasing, assigning or even transferring the rights associated with anything containing the word McAfee.
Question over property rights of McAfee
Intel Corporation, earlier on 7 September 2016, had signed a definitive agreement with a new company that is owned jointly by TPG and Intel, so as to sell Intel Security business, also called McAfee Security formerly. TPG is a world-renowned alternative asset firm. According to the new agreement, the newly proposed business was named McAfee and shall be worth $4.2 billion.
It is here that MGT enters the picture. Before Intel’s agreement with the companies over McAfee, the MGT Capital Investments Inc’s CEO & Executive Chairman, John McAfee filed a lawsuit claiming that its use of John McAfee Global Technologies, Inc. does not infringe trademark rights. MGT believes that its use of this term is not infringing copyright or trademark rights pertaining to Intel, and also there is no breaching of agreement mentioned above.
Meanwhile, Intel hasn’t waited for a judicial action and has went ahead to sign a transaction that conveys those property rights, which MGT believes, Intel may not even be an owner of. Instead, the MGT CEO says that Intel’s contractual documentation appears to be making improper “use of my name.” MGT accused Intel of averting fair competition and also of standing to start fetching “billions of dollars for this misappropriation.” The company’s copy of this lawsuit filed by company to the United States District Court can be extracted from the official website or here. What comes out of the lawsuit is yet to be known.
