Help us Maintain a Fair and Safe Trading Environment.
Help us Maintain a Fair and Safe Trading Environment.
We are appealing for help from our online community, to end the ongoing problems we have had with American LED lighting company, Mr Beams USA. Below is a summation of the sequence of events endured over the past several years of trading.
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.
https://abr.business.gov.au/SearchByAbn.aspx?abn=63149972887
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 website back online.
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 entire business to them, 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, 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.
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.
Here’s where we need your help. Shortly after filing our evidence, Mr Beams USA’s legal team made an application for security for costs against us. Now, in order for the matter to proceed to trial we may be required to pay an initial security deposit of $30,000 and engage a legal practitioner to act on our behalf throughout the trial in coming months. To raise funds and to get this to trial we will be launching an online campaign with a well-known legal funding platform in coming days. To anyone who decides to get behind us and donate, we promise to donate all money raised and awarded by the Federal Court to Motor Neurone Disease Australia (MND), so that they can continue their great work in this country (excludes court costs, legal fees, tax, government charges, commissions payable the fund manager and other statutory costs).
More information will be available in coming days, including the link where people can go to donate.
In the meantime, we would like to thank everyone for their continued support.
Yours Sincerely,
MRBEAMS.COM.AU
