Winamax IP claims over sit'n'go format dismissed by French court
Court rejects claims made by French poker operator that Playtech infringed on its IP rights over its Expresso sit'n'go game format
Winamax has had its claims that Playtech infringed on intellectual property rights surrounding its Expresso poker game dismissed by a French court.
In August Winamax argued Playtech’s Twister poker product infringed on the rights of its jackpot prizepool sit’n’go game released in August last year, and requested that the game be made unavailable to players in France.
The firm also sought action against operators offering the product to customers in the country including Playtech, Betclic Everest and Unibet, and claimed damages of 5,000 from each company.
However the court rejected the company’s claims in a hearing earlier this month having found Expresso to be “neither innovative nor original” and that there was no likelihood that customers would be confused as to which game was which.
The court ordered Winamax to compensate Playtech, Betclic Everest and Unibet 3,000 each and pay costs of 167.62.
A spokesperson for Winamax defended its case however and told eGaming Review that a lack of patent protection for software in France made it “very difficult to protect intellectual property rights on this kind of innovation”.
PokerStars recently launched its own version of the jackpot prizepool sit’n’go format entitled Spin and Go, with more than 14 million games played on the site in its first two weeks.
Winamax remains the leading cash game poker operator in France but has seen PokerStars.fr eat away at its lead in recent months, while Playtech’s France-facing iPoker network sits fourth behind PartyPoker.fr.
Various patent disputes over fast-fold poker variants have been filed in the past and earlier this year Pokerstars won a long-winded fight to win a patent from the US Patent and Trademark Office for its Zoom Poker product.
Playtech had yet to respond to requests for comment on this story at the time of writing.