What comes to your mind when you hear Mole Cake?
This is how one could sum up a dispute between two well-known
producers of baking powder mixtures – the food industry
Goliath, Dr. Oetker (as plaintiff), against the Czech David, Labeta
(as defendant). And it was the depiction of the dessert in the form
of a molehill on the box of Labeta's Crumb Cake that was the
imaginary apple of discord.
The question was seemingly simple – can one
undertaking deny others the right to use a depiction of a cake in
the shape of a spherical cap?
The Regional Court in Hradec Králové was of the
opinion that the answer is "yes". In the first instance,
the Court upheld Dr. Oetker's action and prohibited Labeta from
marketing the Crumb Cake in packaging which, on the front,
presented a depiction of a cake in the shape of a spherical cap or,
alternatively, a spherical cap with a cut. (For those of us who are
not familiar with mathematical terms - a molehill can be
