World fast-food behemoth McDonald's has lost an eight-year legal battle to prevent a Malaysian restaurant calling itself McCurry. McDonald heavy handed tactic to bully a local eatery submit to its whim-wham had finally come to an end in Malaysia. With its global reach, huge market shares and strong financial clouts, McDonald had found it difficult if not impossible to muscle it way into Malaysia's fast food business this time.
McCurry is an Indian food outlet in Kuala Lumpur; it opened for business in 1999, and serves Indian dishes, including fish head curry and breads. McDonald's, which has more than 180 outlets in Malaysia, first sued the McCurry restaurant in 2001. A High Court ruled in favor of the international chain in 2006, but then McCurry took the case to the Court of Appeal, which overturned the ruling .
McDonald's argued that the use of the "Mc" prefix infringed its trademark. McDonald’s filed an application to contest the ruling after the Court of Appeal ruled in April it was wrong to assume that McDonald’s had a monopoly on the use of the prefix “Mc”.
During the court hearings, owner of McCurry contended that McDonald’s could not claim monopoly or exclusive rights to the use of “Mc” as that prefix was extensively used around the world as surnames, particularly by people of Scottish origin. He further insist that "Mc" Curry prefix is an abbreviation for Malaysian Chicken.
Federal Court in Kuala Lumpur ruled that there was no evidence to show McCurry was trying to pass itself off as part of the McDonald's empire. The three-member panel of judges had unanimously dismissed the application with costs and sided with the defendant argument. The judges further ordered McDonald to stop the same appeal against the lower court ruling in the future.
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