H&K copywrite crackdown
 

Hiyya

I heard that H&K were cracking down on non-licensed uses of their guns. What companies would this effect? Does this mean some guns and their parts are going to get scarce real soon?

Are you talking about the AirsoftGI announcement? I would say it's pretty much a US thing only. That's the only place it can really be controlled.

well taking into consideration that a significant portion of manufacturers are in Asia not many.

It would affect everybody that's not licensed by Umarex.

Namely:
WE
ARES
Echo1 (OEM'd by JG or Asia Electric Gun or whatever)
JG (good luck with that)

Not-affected:
VFC
KWA

Spartan Imports, JAG are all affiliated with VFC and KWA in some way or another so I don't think they would try to piss off Umarex by carrying competing brands of H&K products moving forwards. Remember what happened to Cybergun and Jag Precision/Echo1 last year regarding the FN Herstal license? Distributors are starting to move away from non-licensed products for fear of being shut down by Umarex/Cybergun and other copyright holders. It's not necessarily a bad thing as the real steel companies are choosing the better companies with whom to partner with.

The wildcard here is TM but since they don't directly export into jurisdictions where H&K/Umarex controls, I don't think they give a shit. Most of the TM products in North America are grey-marketed anyway.

Actually ARES does do OEM service for Umarex. Look at the "Umarex G36" it's an ARES underneath but with HK trades on it and in a Umarex box.

US ports of entry are very tightly controlled and copyrights are enforced quite strictly. I doubt it will completely eliminate the availability of other brands versions, but it would make them harder to get into or from the states.

Ah you are right.

It's actually been going on for quite a while, since 2008/2009 if I recall. The only ones that don't give a crap are apparently JG and Cyma (G36 and MP5 series), ICS changed a bit the form of the guns so they could go through.

What does G&G fall under?

They aren't affected cause the Umarex MP5 aeg is a G&G. So they got the trades on those.

That doesn't really have a good answer, since some of their guns are licensed, like the F2000, and some aren't like their P90 and UMP.

I foresee some licensing rights being givin/bought by up and ip H&K makers. JG and such will probably be asked to stop production instead of a lawsuit. This is of course if it's worth going after them at all. Sone companies will slightly modify their guns to look a little different and call the gun something else (for example; the KWA ATP equals Glock). H&K could do anything from asking for tge removal of trades from non supported brands, to the alteration of guns, to production ceasing. And of course there is always lawsuits...

This is really not news. The only reason people are more accepting these crap is because Umarex and Cybergun decided to be smarter and get better manufacture.

FYI: Cybergun in Europe trade mark bunch of stuff that they should'nt have given. ie Back Spin, Hop up, Tokyo Marui, Classic Army

Back spin is a physics terms
Hop up is a trade mark of Marui
Tokyomarui and Classmic Army are companies.

Ah I see, thanks. Ive got a G&G UMP, and its a great gun. Fortunatly it never seems to break down on me, but when it does its a real pain to find parts for other than directly from G&G themselves. So I wanted to make sure I wasnt going to run into an issue with it or another H&K model from them Id get like the MP5 series.