We are appealing for support from the community, to help us bring our case to trial. In April this year we sort to have an ongoing dispute with Mr Beams USA heard before The Federal Court of Australia. Shortly after filing evidence, Mr Beams USA’s legal team made an application for security for costs. Now, this means that we may be required to pay a $30,000 security deposit and engage a legal practitioner before the matter can be heard in coming months.
To anyone who decides to get behind us and push this to trial, we will donate all money raised by Funded Justice and awarded by the Federal Court of Australia to Motor Neurone Disease Australia (MND) (Excludes court costs, legal fees, tax, government charges, commission and credit card processing charges payable to Funded Justice, PayPal fees and other statutory costs).
Below is a short summary of the events leading up to our decision to have the matter heard before The Federal Court of Australia.
- On the 31st of March 2011 our company, Home Lighting Solutions P/L, registered the Australian business trading name, MRBEAMS.COM.AU. If you follow the link below you will find the first registration date for MRBEAMS.COM.AU.Home Lighting Solutions P/L was the first company to register and commence trading under the name MRBEAMS.COM.AU (No similar trading names or trademarks were registered or in use in Australia at that time).
- In July 2013 our website, www.mrbeams.com.au was severely compromised by international hackers and it wasn’t until around two weeks later, after spending thousands in web development costs, that we were able to get our online business up and running again.
- Several weeks later, between the 21st of October and the 8th of November 2013, Mr Beams USA contacted us on a number of occasions (via email) and expressed an interest to purchase our business in Australia, including our website www.mrbeams.com.au and Australian customer list. We declined the meagre offers (<$1,000 AUD) put forward by Mr Beams USA at that time, because by that stage it had costs us tens of thousands of dollars to build our online business in Australia (websites and online marketing were very expensive several years ago).
- Mr Beams USA then engaged law firms in the US and Australia and began sending letters of demand requesting that we immediately hand over our business in Australia, including our website www.mrbeams.com.au and customer list. In late 2013 and early 2014 Mr Beams USA’s legal representatives threatened to sue us in the Federal Court if we did not immediately comply with all of their demands.
- Not content with our ongoing refusal to comply with their demands, Mr Beams USA then decided to take control of our intellectual property unlawfully. In January 2014, without prior warning, Mr Beams USA colluded with an American based web development company (Webedge Design LLC), obtained unauthorised access to our website and replaced all content with a landing page directing all online traffic to their website hosted in the US instead (www.mrbeams.com). Screen shots of the landing page created by Mr Beams USA in 2014 were immediately sent to our domain registrar, Melbourne IT and the website was shut down to mitigate any further unauthorised use. Mr Beams USA’s actions were later reported to the Australian Cybercrime Reporting Network (ACORN) and a report subsequently filed with the CIU branch of Victorian Police (The profile picture of this campaigne is also the screenshot).
- In 2015 Mr Beams USA registered the Australian trademark, “Mr. Beams” in the LED lighting category.
- In 2016 we made an application to trademark our trading name, “MRBEAMS.COM.AU” in the Antique/Second Hand Furniture category. Our application was later opposed by Mr Beams USA’s legal representatives.
- Left with no option but to protect our business and intellectual property from the clutches of Mr Beams USA, in April this year we sort to have the matter heard before the Federal Court of Australia.
Please help us raise enough money and get this to trial, and in return we will help MND continue their great work in Australia. (To ensure complete transparency, all financials will be prapared and published by an independant chartered accounting firm).
Yours Sincerely,
MRBEAMS.COM.AU
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