The World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO) reviewed a UDPR complaint filed against Tecme.com. It was submitted by the Argentine company Tecme S.A, which produces, among other things, ventilators, and therefore, drew greater interest during the pandemic. Perhaps the Tecme S.A. lawyers wanted to take advantage of this moment. They sought to prove that the current registrant of the domain, Stephen Bougourd, owned it, violating the rights of the Argentinian company.
However, it was not difficult to establish the truth. Back in 1996, Bougourd started a completely legal consulting business called Technology Made Easy (TEC M E). In 2000, he registered the domain name Tecme.com. Later Stephen Bougourd changed the name of his company but decided to keep the domain for himself. As for Tecme S.A, all of its trademarks were registered no earlier than in 2010.
The registrant did not hire lawyers and represented his own interests during the proceedings. He also had no complaints against Tecme S.A. and only sought to defend his rights to the domain name. But WIPO panelist Scott Blackmer went a step further, according to Domain Name Wire. In his decision, he noted that the company displayed “a remarkable lack of realism.” As a result, the rights to manage Tecme.com remained with the registrant, and Tecme S.A. was found guilty of attempting reverse domain name hijacking.
