BMW vs Geely: Brands in local fight over trademarks

The
Geely EX5
mid-size electric SUV is already on sale, but a trademark dispute could force it to be renamed.
Two months after acceptance of the 'Geely EX5' trademark was published by IP Australia on December 17, 2024, BMW submitted a notice of intention to oppose Geely's filing on February 17, 2025.
It has until July 29, 2025 to provide evidence to support its opposition.
It appears BMW's opposition to the nameplate is due to the similarity with its long-running X5 nameplate.
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'BMW Group protects its well established reputation in its premium products which are highly regarded and valued by consumers,' said a BMW Group Australia spokesperson when asked about the trademark opposition.
'We are aware of the application and are considering our options and do not otherwise wish to comment on the related legal processes.'
But no opposition has been recorded yet for a subsequent Geely filing made on December 23, 2024, of which acceptance was published on May 24, 2025, for simply 'EX5'.
Geely has also filed to trademark 'Geely EX2' and 'Geely EX3', which may also fall afoul of BMW given it sells models wearing the X2, iX2, X3 and iX3 nameplates.
'Geely Auto Australia is aware of an opposition regarding the trademark of one of its model names. As this is a legal matter, we will not be making any further comments at this stage,' said a Geely Auto Australia spokesperson.
The EX5 is known in China as the E5, and is sold under the Geely Galaxy sub-brand, which also offers the L7 electric vehicle (EV) and the Starship 7 EM-i plug-in hybrid (PHEV), the latter of which was
recently spied testing in Australia.
Galaxy branding isn't used here.
Geely isn't the first automaker to find itself in a trademark dispute.
Audi, for example,
opposed trademark applications by Chinese brand Nio
in 2023 for the ES6, ES7 and ES8 nameplates, which it argued would be 'likely to deceive or cause confusion' and were 'substantially identical or deceptively similar' trademarks to its own.
The German brand sells vehicles under the
S6
,
S7
and
S8
nameplates.
It was ultimately unsuccessful in forcing Nio to change its nameplates, though the Chinese brand nevertheless still has yet to enter the Australian market.
MG is now launching vehicles with very similar nameplates to Audi models, with the
MGS5 EV
already on sale and the
MGS6 EV
due on sale here in 2026. Audi sells both
S5
and S6 model variants.
Audi didn't respond to our requests for comment following the publication of the MGS5 EV trademark earlier this year. We've also contacted the company about the subsequent filing for MGS6 EV.

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