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Bottom line: The Board found that “LPA” is not confusingly similar to “ALPA logo”.

The applicant filed a trademark application for “LPA” in standard character designating telecommunication devices and apparatus, antennas for cell phones, etc. in Class 9.  The examiner refused to register the mark, citing “ALPA” logo shown below for telecommunication devices and apparatus, etc. in Class 9.

<Cited mark>

Both marks designate identical goods “telecommunication devices and apparatus”.  So the question is whether the marks are distinguishable or not.

The Board reviewed the marks and found as follows:

- The applied-for mark is regarded as a fancy word and has no particular meaning.  The mark is pronounced [L-P-A], each letter separately.
- The cited mark is composed of a device, followed by “LPA”.  The device appears to be a letter “A” having a house-like image within it.  All letters of the mark are in red, and the mark is unified as a whole in appearance.  Accordingly, the mark is regarded as “APLA”.  Therefore, the mark is a fancy word having no particular meaning, and is pronounced [A-L-P-A] or [a-ru-pa].  Also, the owner of the cited mark provides the transliteration in katakana corresponding to the pronunciation [a-ru-pa] on its website.
- The applied-for mark and the cited mark are clearly distinguishable in appearance.  Comparing [L-P-A] and [a-ru-pa], the marks are clearly distinguishable in sound because they are different in number and structure of sound.  Further, comparing [L-P-A] and [A-L-P-A], the marks are clearly distinguishable in sound because the prominent first sounds are different from each other.  The marks are not comparable in meaning.  Therefore, the marks are not confusingly similar to each other.

And so the Board reversed the refusal, and granted registration of “LPA”.