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Thomann takes legal action against Fender

thomann.de

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Re: Thomann takes legal action against Fender

#11

Post by al_borland »

vintermann wrote: post #7

Apparently Fender got bought up by a private equity fund, Servco Pacific Capital. Who would have guessed.

Apparently this started back in 1985.

> In 1985, Bill Schultz and a group of investors—including company employees and external companies like Servco Pacific Capitol—purchased Fender from CBS for $12.5 million and renamed it "Fender Musical Instruments Corporation" (FMIC).

> Ownership changed in December 2001, when private equity firm Weston Presidio bought a controlling stake in Fender for $57.8 million.

> Longtime investor Servco instead bought out Weston Presidio, with TPG Growth as an equal partner.

> In 2020, Servco bought out TPG Growth's stake, making them Fender's majority owner.

A long history of private equity ownership. I'm not sure CBS owning them would be much better, which started in 1965.

As much as I like to blame private equity for the downfall of once great companies, I'm not sure how to feel about this one, as they've been investor owned and passed around for decades.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fender_%28company%29

Re: Thomann takes legal action against Fender

#12

Post by jwitthuhn »

vintermann wrote: post #7

Apparently Fender got bought up by a private equity fund, Servco Pacific Capital. Who would have guessed.

This is true but the buyout happened in 1985. Servco Pacific has been in charge for longer than Leo Fender and CBS, the two previous owners, put together.

Re: Thomann takes legal action against Fender

#13

Post by alexjplant »

vintermann wrote: post #7

Apparently Fender got bought up by a private equity fund, Servco Pacific Capital. Who would have guessed.

Makes complete sense to me. Fender has immense cultural cachet among multiple big-spending demographics: blues boomers, Cobain disciples, indie kids, even the hair metal guys via Charvel. The Gibson/Harley-Davidson move of leveraging a company that makes stuff into a lifestyle brand is the play here. Fender would rather throw legal weight around to execute that than compete by building high-quality guitars at a good price.

Too many Clapton lawyers have gotten hip to boutique builders. Fender would rather make them buy a $5000 Masterbuilt Custom Shop Deluxe Roadworn Heritage Double Relic No-Caster than a Tom Anderson or Suhr. Same for kids buying Harley Bentons and ESPs - a $1000 Indonesian-built instrument is their future if Fender has anything to say about it.

Re: Thomann takes legal action against Fender

#16

Post by dofm »

I still think this whole Fender-suing-everyone thing will end up with Thomann owning them either partially or completely.

But the weird German lawsuit was always about the fact that some private equity suits (or bad Hawaiian shirts, it seems) are upset that Thomann (and others) sell the PRS Silver Sky, which as they have probably deduced from the reverb.com data they now own, likely outsells equivalent Fender models by some margin.

So I think Thomann are just bringing it on.

And they aren't the only ones: LSL hired the lawyer who won the judgement that put the S-type body shape in the public domain in 2009.

Re: Thomann takes legal action against Fender

#17

Post by leoc »

al_borland wrote: post #11
vintermann wrote: post #7

Apparently Fender got bought up by a private equity fund, Servco Pacific Capital. Who would have guessed.

Apparently this started back in 1985. > In 1985, Bill Schultz and a group of investors—including company employees and external companies like Servco Pacific Capitol—purchased Fender from CBS for $12.5 million and renamed it "Fender Musical Instruments Corporation" (FMIC). > Ownership changed in December 2001, when private equity firm Weston Presidio bought a controlling stake in Fender for $57.8 million. > Longtime…

IIRC pre-GFC FMIC has a generally good reputation among guitarists, and certainly in comparison to the preceding era of Fender, when it was owned by CBS.

Re: Thomann takes legal action against Fender

#18

Post by dofm »

worik wrote: post #15

I am confused. What is this about?

1) Fender got someone in Germany to buy a Strat type guitar from a Chinese vendor on Aliexpress and ship it to Germany (I assume this part)

2) Fender sued said small Chinese Aliexpress vendor in a regional German court for selling a "copied" design in Germany

3) The small Chinese guitar vendor didn't turn up, obviously

4) Fender got a default judgement that the S-type (Stratocaster etc.) guitar body shape (which has indisputably been in the public domain in the USA since 2009) is a "functional work of art" in which they have copyright.

5) Fender's weird law firm went on a rampage, in the EU and USA, using said default judgement as if it represents some kind of precedent, warning guitar firms (PRS included) and music retailers to stop selling them, recall and destroy their inventory on sale in the EU, and confirm they had done so, or be sued

6) guitar people, especially luthiers working in the USA who have solid reason to believe the S shape is public domain, took that about as well as you'd expect

7) Fender tried to walk it back, especially the bit about smashing perfectly good guitars

8) Thomann, based in Germany, certainly Fender's largest retailer outside the USA and one of the biggest music retailers in the world, have decided not to take it lying down.

Re: Thomann takes legal action against Fender

#19

Post by Animats »

This is a place where European copyright law is significantly different from US copyright law. In the US, copyright cannot cover a "functional part", which is why there is a third party auto parts industry. Improved functionality can be covered by a utility patent, but that lasts only 20 years. Designs can be protected by design patents, which last only 15 years. So in the US, any rights left in the form of the Stratocaster expired long ago.

US companies sometimes try to make "trade dress" or trademark claims, but that's much weaker than copyright.

Re: Thomann takes legal action against Fender

#20

Post by codedokode »

Animats wrote: post #19

This is a place where European copyright law is significantly different from US copyright law. In the US, copyright cannot cover a "functional part", which is why there is a third party auto parts industry. Improved functionality can be covered by a utility patent, but that lasts only 20 years. Designs can be protected by design patents, which last only 15 years. So in the US, any rights left in the form of the Strat…

But technically the guitar does not have to have a shape of a strat. It could be any other shape, why not be creative and make your own design?
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