Italian coffee manufacturer Lavazza has hit back against an infringement case brought by Australian rival Vittoria over two Oro trade marks, saying Vittoria’s rights over the marks should be revoked and claiming four decades of prior continuous use of its own unregistered mark.
A judge’s decision refusing to approve a $42 million settlement in a shareholder class action against Murray Goulburn because of a “too high” funder’s commission has set the stage for a showdown over the power of courts to alter funding agreements, a battle potentially more consequential than the fight over common fund orders now before the High Court.
A judge has briefly stayed his $76.6 million judgment against IOOF subsidiary Australian Executor Trustees over the sale of a timber plantation by the collapsed Gunns Group as AET weighs an appeal of the ruling, which dismissed its cross-claim against law firm Sparke Helmore.
The Federal Government has lost a challenge raising discrimination concerns around a Fair Work Commission-approved enterprise agreement covering metropolitan firefighters in Victoria, with an FWC review panel finding its appeal lacked merit.
Lawyers behind four quasi representative proceedings against the liquidators of collapsed HIH Insurance have launched a bid to recoup the costs of their successful 18-year-long legal battle.
A judge has dismissed three proceedings by shareholders against the liquidator of failed global financial services firm Babcock & Brown, in a finding that highlights “serious problems” with market-based causation and may have ramifications for securities class actions.
A judge has signed off on a settlement of a long-running class action against Westpac unit BankSA, and has ruled the law firm that brought the case has an equitable right to unpaid legal costs for investigating the case before it found a funder.
Ex-Tennis Australia director and current Dentons partner Steve Healy, who is facing action by the corporate regulator over the broadcast rights to the Australian Open, has lost a bid for access to six years of emails between two other former board members.
A partner at Big Six firm Ashurst has challenged a NSW Supreme Court decision appointing liquidators to his Point Piper home in a protracted dispute with an ex-judge neighbour, saying the judge was confused and made an order which was an “affront to our system of adversarial justice”.
Activist US short seller Bonitas Research is refusing to participate in legal action brought in Australia by Rural Funds Group, as it continues to press allegations of fraud, which sent the agricultural fund manager’s share price plummeting.