King on Candy trademark: Our IP is constantly infringed

There have been widespread reports this week that King, creators of the world-dominating Candy Crush Saga, has trademarked the word ‘Candy’ and is asking other developers to remove the term from their own titles.

Such a move prompted plenty of discussion on social media about how enforceable such a trademark can be, but now King has spoken out to clarify the motivations behind this move.

In a statement to Forbes, the firm wrote: "We have trademarked the word ‘candy’ in the EU, as our IP is constantly being infringed and we have to enforce our rights and to protect our players from confusion. We don’t enforce against all uses of ‘candy’ – some are legitimate and of course, we would not ask App developers who use the term legitimately to stop doing so.

"The particular App in this instance was called ‘Candy Casino Slots – Jewels Craze Connect: Big Blast Mania Land’, but its icon in the App store just says ‘Candy Slots’, focussing heavily on our trademark. As well as infringing our and other developers’ IP, use of keywords like this as an App name is also a clear breach of Apple’s terms of use. We believe this App name was a calculated attempt to use other companies’ IP to enhance its own games, through means such as search rankings."

Candy Crush Saga is, as all of our readers are no doubt aware, one of the biggest games in the world. It has amassed more than half a billion downloads in a little over a year and draws in nearly $1m in revenue on a daily basis.