In recent days, news has emerged that ITA Airways, the owner of the Alitalia trademark, has won an appeal before the Court of Rome against the Aeroitalia trademark, with the court recognizing a violation by the latter of ITA’s exclusive trademark rights.
The trademark dispute has been ongoing since late 2023 and is based on an alleged similarity between the two brands “Alitalia” and its iconic “A” and “Aeroitalia.”
The “Alitalia” trademark is a historic aviation brand, highly representative for Italians. Since the 1970s, it has been the symbol of Italy’s national flag carrier for decades, and it also gave rise to the simplified logo featuring just the stylized letter “A.” This iconic symbol resembles a stylized airplane tail, colored in green, white, and red — the colors of the Italian national flag. Originally owned by the airline itself, the trademark was transferred to ITA Airways, which acquired it in 2021 for about €90 million after Alitalia’s financial collapse. ITA Airways incorporated the historic brand into its own logo, adding the phrase “Inspired by Alitalia” alongside its name, as a tribute to the legacy of the brand and the airline.
Aeroitalia, on the other hand, is a newer airline: a private company founded in late 2021, it now operates mainly as a carrier within Italy, focusing on routes to the major islands and on charter flights. Its branding features a green motif and a capital letter “A” in the colors of the Italian flag — green, white, and red — which was registered with the European Union Intellectual Property Office (EUIPO) in June 2022.
This symbol, along with the phonetic similarity between the two brand names, led ITA Airways to file a complaint before the Court of Rome. In the appeal ruling issued in recent days, the court ordered the prohibition of the use of the Aeroitalia trademark due to its similarity with the Alitalia brand.
The appellate judges determined that there is a high degree of similarity between the two trademarks, both in terms of lettering and phonetics, as well as in their visual appearance. As a result, they ordered a ban, starting January 2026, on the use of the “Aeroitalia” name and logo, including the stylized tricolor “A” and any other mark similar to those registered by ITA Airways. Furthermore, they imposed an immediate prohibition, starting 15 days from the notification of the order, on the use of the domain name aeroitalia.com or any confusingly similar domain name, with a financial penalty for each day of non-compliance.
It is important to note, however, that the Court of Appeal’s decision completely overturned the first-instance ruling from February 2024, which had rejected ITA Airways’ precautionary request and sided with Aeroitalia. The first-instance judges had found the two marks not to be visually confusing, partly due to the high public recognition of the Alitalia brand, which they believed reduced the risk of consumer confusion. As a result, Aeroitalia had been allowed to continue using its brand and logo without restrictions — at least until the appellate decision issued in early June this year.
[1] Corriere.it, Alitalia, I giudici danno ragione a Ita Airways, June 2025
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