Question

Intellectual Property:

You are the manager of Gamecock Chicken franchise and are presented with the following facts:

Rooster Fil A has a world-famous dipping sauce called Cock a Doodle Doo sauce. Some people claim that they only buy the chicken for the sauce. The dipping sauce is a combination of 10 herbs and spices with a mayonnaise base. Rooster calls it “their secret sauce.” Rooster’s competitor, Gamecock Chicken, sent an employee to try and watch Rooster make the sauce. The Gamecock employee sat in the dining area and could visibly see the Rooster employee add 9 identifiable spices to the mayonnaise but could not see the 10th. The Gamecock employee then went back to his own shop and attempted to recreate the recipe. After several attempts, Gamecock figured out the missing spice and began to market their sauce as “Something to Crow About.” Rooster brought an action for misappropriation of a trade secret. Will they be successful?

Answer 1

Though this is a hypothetical situation still there are various assumptions and conclusions which need to be undertaken.we can classify the situation and conclude the outcome on the basis of two parameters-

• Suppose Rooster fil has copyrighted the recipe and no one can use this recipe by recreating it any way then gamecock chicken would have to stop the usage and furthermore Rooster fil can sue the gamecock chicken franchise for compensation.

• Now in the second scenario, suppose there is no copyright for the concerned recipe and then the gamecock chicken franchise tried and succeeded to recreate the sauce then the Rooster fil would not be able to protect itself from imitation of recipe.