Apple logos and trademarks

Apple is one of the most popular companies of our time. Its success was also due to its recognizable and memorable logo. Read about the history of the bitten apple in our article.

History of the logo

In 1976, Steve Jobs and his friends created a new company, but he didn’t know what to call it. The entrepreneur suggested “Apple” as a temporary solution. The word was listed above Atari in the phone book, the name of the company he had worked for before.

First logo created Ron Wayne, who was one of the founders of the corporation. His version resembled a coat of arms: it depicted Newton sitting under a tree. An apple hung above his head. There was also this inscription: “The mind forever traveling through strange seas of thought alone.”

A year later, Wayne left Apple, taking with him a check for $800. His former partners, Steve Jobs and Steve Wozniak, thus bought out his share. If he had stayed in the business, this money could have turned into $72 billion!

Jobs considered the Newton logo complicated, outdated, and not reflecting the philosophy of his brainchild. Then he decided to use the services of the advertising agency Regis McKenna. The entrepreneur wanted the logo to be simple, modern, and recognizable.

The new version was developed by designer Rob Janoff. He bought a lot of apples and started drawing them from different sides. In the end, he depicted a bitten fruit. Interestingly, in English, “bite” also means the computer term “byte”.

Jobs liked the idea very much, but he insisted on a color version, since Apple produced PCs with color monitors. In his opinion, this would bring success to the company. The designer agreed and colored the fruit in the colors of the rainbow, but did not arrange them in order. This logo was used until 1998. By the way, Yanov never received anything for his work. This was typical of Jobs, who never thanked many of the employees who stood at the origins of the future tech giant.

In the early 2000s, the corporation began using a monochrome apple. It was depicted as convex and in blue. The logo was also increased in size. In 2007, the logo began to look like a steel apple. It was repainted silver. In 2015, after the death of the founder, the apple became black again, it no longer had volume or texture. The company still uses this logo today.

Trademarks

Apple, the Apple logo, AirDrop, AirPlay, AirPrint, Apple Music, Apple Pencil, Apple TV, Apple Watch, Digital Crown, Face ID, FaceTime, Finder, GarageBand, Handoff, iMovie, iPad, iPadOS, iPad Pro, iPhone, iTunes, iWork, Keychain, Keynote, Launchpad, Mac, MacBook, MacBook Pro, macOS, Magic Mouse, Motion, Numbers, OS X, Pages, QuickTime, Safari, Siri, Soundtrack, Spaces, Spotlight, Touch ID, TrueType, and WebObjects are commodity marks of Apple Inc., registered in the U.S. and other countries.

In Russia, the corporation has more than 200 registered trademarks and applications for their registration — Apple«Apple“, “iPhone“, “iPad“, “And under“, “ipod” and many others.

Litigation

Apple often finds itself embroiled in intellectual property disputes. Here are some notable examples.

In 2020, Apple wanted ban the Prepear logo. The lawsuit noted that the green pear allegedly resembled a bitten apple.

Prepear co-founder Russell Monson launched petition “Save the Apple Pear!”, which was signed by tens of thousands of people. After a lengthy debate, Apple asked to change the shape of the leaf, allowing Prepear to use the pear.

In 2019 Rospatent refused Apple is seeking to register a trademark for augmented reality (AR) technology in Russia, as similar trademarks have already been registered in the country.

In 2021, the corporation spoke out against registration trademark in the shape of an apple for use on drinking water bottles. Georgette LLC wanted to register a logo depicting a whole apple with two leaves and the words “I am Arcus.” Apple insisted that the logos were visually similar.

This year Apple lost dispute with Swiss watchmaker Swatch over the use of the phrase “One more thing,” which Jobs used before announcing a new product. The court ruled that the words may have originally belonged to the television series' detective Columbo.

Drawing for registration of 5 trademarks.

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