BlackBerry: RIM Barred From Using BBX Name; Will Call Next-Generation OS BlackBerry 10

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This is yet another lesson for big companies to check and double-check for prior use of their intended brands. RIM has been found to have infringed on another company’s trademark of the term “BBX” and is barred from using the name in its upcoming update to the BlackBerry operating system.

It’s just like when Steve Jobs chose to call his company “Apple” when the Beatles’ recording company was already called “Apple Corps.” It’s also like when Netflix decided to spin off its DVD business as “Qwikster,” when the username had previously been taken by other individuals on Twitter and other social networking sites.

But unlike Apple, though, neither RIM nor Netflix will be able to retain the names they wanted. In the case of RIM, a U.S. federal court in Albuquerque has granted a temporary restraining order preventing RIM from using the term BBX in the name of its next-generation mobile operating system. The court has ruled that Mexican company BASIS International LTD has a valid claim to its trademark for BBX. And given that the two companies’ businesses are closely related (although not in direct competition), the use of BBX on BlackBerry mobile devices will be confusing.

The alleged infringement is likely to cause customers and prospective customers to wrongly believe that the software applications created using BASIS’s development tools are only compatible with RIM’s BBX operating system.

BASIS International creates and maintains its BBx Generations products as cross-platform solutions for Windows, OS X, Linux and other operating systems. Given that BBx tools also run on mobile clients, there is a likelihood for confusion if a major smartphone and tablet operating system were to also use the name.

As such, RIM has announced at its Asian BlackBerry DevCon event that the company has chosen to rename its upcoming QNX-based operating system as “BlackBerry 10.” What’s quite interesting here is that “10″ translates to “X” in Roman numerals. So, while RIM might not formally call its new OS as BBX, it’s quite likely that the smartphone and tablet operating system will still be referred to as “BBX” informally. Is RIM’s BBX is actually “BB10″?

Let’s hope RIM has not yet printed out business cards and letterheads with big, bold BBX brand names.