Dance station Kiss FM taking ARN’s Kiis FM to Federal Court

Melbourne-based dance music station Kiss FM is taking the Australian Radio Network (ARN) to the Federal Court, for adopting the name Kiis FM when it rebranded Sydney Mix late last year.

Kiss FM Dance Music Australia has been operating since 20 years with a global presence. Its Station Manager Tim Byrnes said, “This unauthorised use of the Kiss FM brand by ARN is a blatant violation of Kiss FM’s common law rights in its Kiss FM Brand.  Once pending Kiss FM’s trademark applications proceed to registration (which were filed prior to ARN’s applications), ARN will also be infringing Kiss FM’s registered trade mark rights in the Kiss FM name.

“Kiss FM Dance Music Australia has understandably acted to defend its name and heritage by issuing cease and desist notices on The Australian Radio Network. Kiss FM considers that ARN’s response has been one of contempt and proactive bullying attempting to force Kiss to effectively surrender its name. Though some negotiations have taken place, ARN acts as if it is their God-given commercial right to use the name and to force Kiss to accept it.”

He added that Kiis FM’s mainstream and commercial stance and the employment of identities such as Jackie O and Kyle Sandilands was “the complete antithesis of everything that Kiss FM Dance Music Australia has stood for.”

According to figures based on Mcnair 2007 & KLS 2010/11 & Daily Stream Stats, Kiss FM’s listenership includes 70,000 weekly via 87.6-88FM (53% listen for two hours and more each day), 10,000 on their servers, 11,500 on the Weekly EDM (which 157 DJs resend to their networks), 300,000 via the Telstra T-Hub and 25,000 on the Naturally Grown social media network.