Complaint for domain newmd.com denied at NAF

The Complaint for the domain name newmd.com by Complainant Nuesoft Technologies, Inc. was denied at NAF in one of the shortest ever decisions in UDRP history. Respondent was Larry Smith / ProfessionalThinkers from Arizona, USA. The Complaint was submitted to the National Arbitration Forum on July 12, 2012.

Complainant filed for registration of its NUEMD mark with the United States Patent and Trademark Office on August 16, 2000. The registration was accepted on January 29, 2002 and was effective as of August 16, 2000. The Complainant has used its mark in connection with marketing healthcare management software. Moreover, Complainant owns nuesoft.com and nuemd.com domain names. Respondent registered the disputed newmd.com domain name on May 16, 2000. When contacted by Complainant with an offer to purchase the disputed domain for $100, Respondent declined the offer and expressed an intention to offer it at auction.

Panel found that Respondent registered the disputed domain name on May 16, 2000, prior to Complainant’s trademark registration which was effective August 16, 2000 and Complainant did not contend or establish that it had acquired common law rights in the mark NEUMD before May 16, 2000. Respondent registered the disputed domain name before Complainant acquired rights in its mark. In these circumstances, for bad faith registration to be established, the trademark registration must precede the domain name registration; and that requirement was not met here. The panel found that Complainant failed to meet its burden to prove that Respondent registered the disputed domain name in bad faith as is required by element 3 of the UDRP.

Because the panel found that Complainant failed to prove that Respondent registered and used the disputed domain name in bad faith, the panel did not address elements 1 and 2 of the UDRP. The Complaint was of course denied.