easyGroup Holdings founder and owner Sir Stelios Haji-Ioannou has secured an order from the British High Court directing Honduran passenger charter specialist EasySky (EKY, Tegucigalpa) and its parent Global Air (México City International) to stop using the "easy" prefix as it could be considered brand theft, The Times of London has reported.
The court ordered the Latin American group to change EasySky's branding to one that does not begin with "easy". The airlines also have to change their website domain, Facebook name, and aircraft livery.
"As you would expect, it has caused some customers to presume that it is associated with easyJet. This company is nothing to do with the Easy family of brands and is regarded as a ‘brand thief’," an Easygroup spokesperson said.
The Mexican holding or its Honduran airlines do not operate to either the United Kingdom or the European Union as a whole.
"If [the defendants] do not comply with this order [they] may be held to be in contempt of court and may be imprisoned or fined, or [their] assets may be seized," the High Court said.
A final court hearing is scheduled to take place in October.
EasySky is currently dormant with its only CRJ100(ER) stored at Tegucigalpa. The carrier's website is also inactive. Its parent Global Air is restarting after the grounding, which followed the crash of its B737-200Adv. operating on behalf of Cubana in May 2018.
Haji-Ioannou is expected to pursue similar action against Colombia's EasyFly (Colombia) (Bogotá).
easyGroup is wholly-owned by Haji-Ioannou and licences the "easy" brand to other companies, chiefly easyJet. Haji-Ioannou founded the European LCC back in 1995 and remains its largest shareholder, controlling an 11.7% stake. His siblings Polys and Clelia control an 11% stake each.
easyGroup itself was founded in 1998. It currently licences dozens of "easy"-related brands, covering multiple sectors of the economy from travel to retail and IT. The group also licenced the brand to Tanzania's Fastjet (Dar es Salaam), although the airline bought the trademark in 2017 for USD2.5 million.
