Someone pretending to represent Ubisoft did
This week, the Internet discovered that one of Ubisoft’s trademarks for Watch Dogs — specifically, the one concerned with game software — had been abandoned. This led to plenty of speculation, ranging from a possible cancellation of the game to a name change signifying that it had become a part of the Assassin’s Creed series. Wild, but highly entertaining.
Anyway, no — the truth of the matter is that Ubisoft did not file a request for “express abandonment” of the trademark. Rather, someone claiming to be Ubisoft CEO Yves Guillemot did and apparently that can in fact work. Huh. In a statement to VentureBeat, the company said it was “working directly with the [US Patent and Trademark Office] on reinstating the trademark for Watch Dogs, and it will be active again the in the coming days.”
More importantly, this situation has “no impact” on the game’s development. Phew.
Ubisoft says it is working to reinstate the ‘Watch Dogs’ trademark [VentureBeat]
