- The new Ferrari Formula 1 racing car was designated F150.
- That, Ford Motor Co. felt, was an infringement on its F-150 pickup truck name.
- Ferrari has agreed to change the designation to "F150th Italia."
DEARBORN, Michigan — Ford Motor Company, which has topped the U.S. sales charts for most of the past three decades with its F-Series trucks, has filed suit in U.S. District Court against Italian marque Ferrari over the 2011 Formula 1 racing car, dubbed by Ferrari the F150.
Ford has used F-150 as the model designation for its full-size pickup truck since 1975.
On Thursday, Ferrari agreed to change the designation of the F1 car to "F150th Italia" and denied any intent of exploiting the popularity of the Ford truck brand.
In a letter to Ford, Ferrari noted the racecar designation was for competition. The F150, the letter said, "never has, nor ever will be used as the name of a commercially available product."
Many F1 teams use a simple arithmetical progression to designate new models. Last year's Ferrari racing vehicle, the 56th F1 single-seater produced by the iconic Maranello, Italy, company, was designated F10.
Ferrari unveiled the new car January 28 in Maranello. Ford spokeswoman Anne Marie Gattari said Ford contacted Ferrari and asked them to change the designation.
"Ferrari did not respond in a timely manner, leaving Ford no choice but to take legal action to protect its important brand and trademark rights," Gattari told the Detroit News.
A Ferrari statement said the team names its racing vehicles in chronological order by technical specifications, "or in exceptional cases, to special occasions." The F150 was meant to celebrate the 150th anniversary of the unification of Italy and the company denied any link to any production highway vehicle.
The two companies have a history of strained relations dating from Henry Ford II's attempt to purchase Ferrari in 1963. When the offer was refused, Ford embarked on a multimillion-dollar project to build the GT40 sports prototype, with the specified objective of beating Ferrari in the 24 Hours of Le Mans.
Inside Line says: It remains to be seen whether Ferrari's concessions will satisfy Ford, but we wonder why Ford didn't merely exploit the name of the Ferrari racing car instead of resorting to litigation. Surely there's an ad campaign in a slogan such as, "Even Ferrari envies the toughness of the Ford F-Series." — David Green, Correspondent
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vanquish421 says:
11:37 PM, 02/12/2011
@tmanz: Thank you. So far you have contributed the ONLY useful comment in this long line of verbal garbage some might call a "thread". You're all such idiots. Study some basic law (you don't need to go to college, just use the internet that you're already on) and understand that Ferrari knew better and still went with this anyway. Ford has done nothing wrong and has not overreacted, and anyone who says otherwise obviously starts their day with a full serving of pure ignorance. Its so easy for you people to sit behind a computer and be outraged at what you don't understand, but it just shows that you would be fired from Ford's legal department or any legal department for that matter so quickly it would make your head spin. Good day to the lot of you.
tbone85 says:
07:21 PM, 02/11/2011
Tmanz, I will thank you to not inject any more reason into this thread. The first whiff of rationality really takes all of the fun out.
jscion says:
07:13 PM, 02/11/2011
Gimme a brake!!! These two F150 designations would never even run into each other. Few people would even put two and two together. What a waste of time!!!
pchang7 says:
10:50 AM, 02/11/2011
This is the equivalent of Congress trying baseball players for steroids when there is intense corruption within those same ranks of Congress trying to screw someone for using steroids.
pchang7 says:
10:48 AM, 02/11/2011
They should be paying Ferrari to use F150, not sueing them to get rid of it.
jhatmaker24 says:
09:37 AM, 02/11/2011
Really Ford? You find this that important to waste money on a lawsuit over your damn pickup truck?
Because the first thing I thought of when Ferrari showed their new F1 car was a Ford product...
How about you concentrate more on keeping those sales up than what Ferrari's F1 program is doing...
smallfield says:
05:42 AM, 02/11/2011
Leave it to Ferrari to not realize they are naming a car after the best selling vehicle of all time. I know Ford's marketing guys wouldn't make the inverse mistake of naming a Ford with a MUCH lower volume Ferrari's name.
Maybe Ferrari was trying to capitalize on Ford's better reliability (they could use some help with F1 engines)
"It is basic trademark law. If they don't go after everyone that uses it then they risk not being able to go after anyone that uses it."
+1
" I thought that Ford would get more pissed and make an F1 car to beat Ferrari."
- It's been a few decades, but when they wake up Ford to the mission, they have succeeded.
mhauer says:
11:42 PM, 02/10/2011
@ happy2rev:
You're an idiot.
@ tmanz:
+1 You're right about that one.
dgmail says:
11:07 PM, 02/10/2011
Could of been worse.
Imagine Ferrari calling its new race car the Tundra?
Recall Motors (Toyota) would be screaming like a little girl
tmanz says:
08:46 PM, 02/10/2011
"I will call it silly."
It is basic trademark law. If they don't go after everyone that uses it then they risk not being able to go after anyone that uses it.
You have to protect your trade marks or product names any time they are infringed on or the next guy can site the example where you didn't go after someone for it and it risks it being open to everyone.
Let Ferrari use it with no agreement in place and next thing you know some company in China is exporting F150s