Gianpaolo Todisco

In early June, the Court of Rome upheld the appeal filed by ITA Airways against the precautionary order issued last February in one of the ongoing proceedings between the Italian flag carrier, heir to Alitalia, and Aeroitalia.

To understand the origin of the dispute, it is useful to briefly review the main stages of the case. The history of Alitalia S.p.A. — originally established under the name Società Aerea Italiana — officially ended on October 14, 2021, after more than 75 years of activity. However, the company had already been declared insolvent in 2017 by the Court of Civitavecchia, which had placed it under special administration.

Following several years of receivership, the 2020 ‘Cura Italia’ decree-law authorized the creation of a new company wholly owned by the Ministry of Economy and Finance: ITA Airways S.p.A. From the outset, the relationship between ITA and Alitalia has been formally framed in terms of economic discontinuity, although in reality this separation is in many ways less clear-cut than stated.

A key element of the story is ITA's acquisition of the Alitalia brand and the domain name alitalia.com for approximately €90 million—significantly less than the price initially set at public auction, which, however, received no bids. In this context, ITA had stated that the use of the acquired rights would be limited to the time strictly necessary to update the aircraft livery.

However, behind this operation, there also appears to be a desire to prevent other operators in the sector from acquiring the rights to the Alitalia brand and using them to obstruct the registration of ITA's new distinctive signs, which clearly evoke the company's historical colors and graphics.

It is precisely in this context that ITA has brought both a substantive action and interim proceedings against Aeroitalia S.r.l., a company founded in 2021 by Marc Bourgade, which currently has around 700 employees. At the time of its incorporation, Aeroitalia had already filed two applications for registration (Nos. 2021000200927 and 2021000200906) for a figurative sign with the Italian Patent and Trademark Office (UIBM). The following year, trademark application no. 018715321 was filed with the European Union Intellectual Property Office (EUIPO) for the word mark ‘AEROITALIA’. All registrations cover services in class 39, relating to air transport.