In June 2020, we reported a case of copyright infringement on
the exterior design of a karaoke booth, or K-booth in short (see
the report here.)
Aimyunion, the design owner and Mainland China's leading
K-booth company, was granted a NT$5 million damages award by the IP
Court to be paid by a Taiwanese defendant called MINIK.
A K-Booth design patent CN201530160659, owned by Aimyunion
The exterior design put aside, the entire business model about
K-booths disturbs copyright holders, whose legal actions against
MINIK have never stopped since it placed its first K-booths in
Taiwan's malls in 2018. Interestingly, Aimyunion does not show
much presence in Taiwan's market, possibly due to the intrinsic
legal uncertainties regarding the booth. However, on the question
whether a K-booth engenders copyright infringement, recent answers
from the courts are not much of a gratifying message to copyright
holders. Yang Sheng Multimedia Tech Co., Ltd. v. MINIK
Co., Ltd., 109
