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Adidas sues Australian label White Fox over four stripes design

BBC News Read the original

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Verified facts

  1. Confirmed Adidas is suing Australian label White Fox for selling and advertising clothes with a four-striped design, arguing it is 'deceptively similar' to Adidas's three-stripe logo.

    Multiple results report that Adidas sued White Fox over four-stripe clothing that it says infringes its three-stripe trademark, that the designs are 'substantially identical with or otherwise deceptively similar', and that White Fox was selling and advertising them. No result contradicts the core of the claim.

  2. Confirmed Adidas said it had repeatedly asked White Fox to stop selling and promoting the four-striped clothes since March, but White Fox refused.

    Yahoo News Malaysia states that Adidas said it had repeatedly asked White Fox to stop selling and promoting the clothes since March, but the Sydney-based company refused. Yahoo News Australia likewise reports that White Fox rejected repeated requests, as its rival claims.

  3. Confirmed Adidas's three-striped design has been trademarked in Australia since 1957.

    Multiple results state that Adidas's three-striped design has been trademarked in Australia since 1957, matching the core claim of the date and place. The results do not specifically address the exact wording 'three-striped design' beyond the same description, but this is consistent with the claim.

  4. Confirmed Adidas reported €24.8 billion (£21bn; $28bn) in revenue in 2025.

    Multiple results explicitly report Adidas's 2025 revenue as a record €24.8 billion, including the company's own press release. The pound and dollar conversions vary by source and date (one result gives $28.7bn and another $29.5bn, and none gives £21bn), so those conversions could not be checked exactly, but they do not affect the core euro figure.

  5. Confirmed Adidas is seeking damages, asking that White Fox pay the profit from the products plus interest and costs.

    Multiple results state that Adidas is seeking damages, with White Fox required to pay the profits from the disputed products plus interest and costs. The results support the core claim; the exact filing details beyond this are not needed to verify it.

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No independent source settled these either way. That doesn’t mean they are wrong.

  1. Unverified In the Federal Court on Friday, lawyers for White Fox denied any breach of trademark.

    The results confirm that Adidas sued White Fox in the Federal Court over trademark issues, but none report what White Fox's lawyers said at a Friday hearing or whether they denied any breach. The results do not address the claimed denial, so the claim can neither be confirmed nor contradicted.

  2. Unverified White Fox's lawyers told Justice Ian Jackman that the firm intends to argue that Cotton On, Sportscraft and Glassons sell clothes with 'similar decorative stripes'.

    The results confirm only that Adidas sued White Fox over four-stripe clothing. None of them mention Justice Ian Jackman, White Fox's lawyers, or an argument about Cotton On, Sportscraft and Glassons selling clothes with similar decorative stripes, so the core of the claim is not addressed.

  3. Unverified A three to four-day trial in the Adidas v White Fox case is expected to take place early next year.

    None of the search results mention the Adidas v White Fox case, its trial length, or its expected timing. The results cover unrelated topics such as law review articles, the Unite the Right rally, CNN news listings, and unclaimed property notices.

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