This is also true with regard to the defendant's indication in its various publications that it is an "authorized garage" or an "expert garage", as it has the aforesaid status as defined by the Ministry of Transport, and in this respect it is no different from the official importer's garages.  It was also proven that the defendant has an official permit to be called an "expert garage" for Toyota vehicles, and that there is an obligation in the licensing regulations to publish this expertise, so that in any case there is no basis for any claim regarding misleading consumers.

31. The Defendant's Trade Name - The Defendant does not use the trade name "Toyota Rehovot" but rather the name "Toyota Rehovot Service and Sales Center Authorized Parallel Importer", and in short "Toyota Rehovot - Parallel Import". This trade name accurately reflects the activity of the business that is covered under a parallel import framework, which is geographically located in the city of Rehovot.
32. The domain name "Toyota-rr" - the use of the plaintiff's trademark under the domain name is also protected by the "true use" protection and meets the conditions set out in the case of Tommy Hilfiger and Toto Gold. The use of the letters "RR" is the acronym for the defendant's name in the Registrar of Companies - Rehovot Vehicle, and it distinguishes between its website and the official importer's website.  It was further argued in this regard that a brief examination of the defendant's homepage is sufficient to understand that the company operates through parallel imports, and there is an expansion in this regard under the label "About Us" on the website, where the defendant explains why it is worthwhile for the consumer to purchase a vehicle through parallel imports.  In any event, a user of the defendant's website cannot be confused and believe that it is an official importer of the plaintiff.
33. Visibility of the business - It has been proven that the use of red, white, black or silver colors in billboards is accepted in the automotive industry by official importers of vehicles made by other manufacturers and even in general garages. The plaintiff is not entitled to appropriate the use of these colors for herself and to claim that their use constitutes deception.  The rule is that one should not grant monopolyorlistic intellectual property protection to any color or combination of colors, since the colors and their use are in the public domain.  Even the red chairs in the business are not in the garage itself, but in the waiting office of Yaad Leasing Company.  The defendant also does not have a showroom and the model vehicles are under the open sky.  In addition, licensed Toyota garages have strict conditions regarding the appearance of the garages and the defendant does not meet these strict conditions.  In any event, the consumers are able to understand the striking difference between the showroom of the official importer's agents and the defendant's sales yard.

As for the entrance sign to the garage - the Ministry of Transportation requires the garage to set visible signs from the entrance to the garage regarding the products and models in which the garage is an expert.  In the event that the defendant does not act as aforesaid, the Ministry of Transportation is entitled to cancel its recognition of the garage's expertise.  This sign even explicitly clarifies that this is a parallel import.

34. The claim of publications similar to authorized Toyota dealerships - the defendant argues that this claim should be dismissed out of hand already because it does not deal with the plaintiff's publications, but rather with the publications of authorized dealerships, and in any case the plaintiff lacks status or cause of action on this issue. The argument must be rejected even on its merits, since it has been proven in the present proceeding, that this is at most a similar advertising idea with a completely different application, and this state of affairs is not protected by law.
35. Absence of infringement with respect to the photographs - the defendants did not infringe the plaintiff's copyright in any of the images, since the defendant purchased the photographs that she used in her advertisements and did not copy them from the plaintiff. According to the testimony of the prosecution witness Aslan, the plaintiff also does not own the copyright in these photographs.  This is because these are photographs, some of which were taken by Toyota dealerships in Israel and not by the plaintiff herself, and some of them were purchased from a photo database.
36. Expert surveys - The survey conducted by the prosecution expert is biased and misleading, includes only two questions and no valid conclusion can be drawn from it. The survey was not even addressed to a relevant audience.  On the other hand, Prof.  Katz's opinion teaches that the words "parallel imports" make it clear to consumers that this is a licensed garage on behalf of the parallel importer and not on behalf of the official importer.
37. No proof of passing off - the elements that form the tort under Section 1(a) of the Commercial Torts Law, 5759-1999 (the "Commercial Torts Law") were not proven. First, there is no proof of damage to reputation because there is no dispute that the plaintiff herself never provided sales, repair and maintenance services for a vehicle in Israel.  Second, the plaintiff takes care to state in all of its publications that it operates within the framework of parallel imports in order to differentiate itself from the official importer, and even in some of its publications it explicitly clarifies that it does not belong to the official importer's garage chain.  The purchase of vehicles is a significant transaction at a high cost to consumers, and they carefully examine its details, and in any case there is no chance of misleading them on this central issue.  This is especially true that no evidence of actual deception by any consumer was presented.
38. There was no proof of enrichment - the vehicles and spare parts were all purchased in exchange for consideration. Over the years, the courts have even dismissed various lawsuits against parallel importers by virtue of the cause of enrichment rather than in law.
39. There is no basis for personal liability on the part of the defendant - all the acts described in the statement of claim were committed by the defendant company and not by the defendant Raz personally. Advertising agencies, including advertising agencies, deal with the issue of advertising, and Raz was not even involved in the design of the business.  Raz is also not personally involved in the purchase of vehicles abroad or their import to Israel and does not handle their marketing, but rather the company's activity is pure, which employs 15 employees who are engaged in the marketing and repair services of Toyota vehicles.

IV. Discussion and Decision

D1.  Opening Note

40. As a starting point for deciding the disputes of the parties in the present proceeding, it should be noted and noted that the very activity of importing, parallel, i.e., commercial activity of importing and marketing products without a direct contract with the manufacturer and without the status of an "official importer", has long been recognized in law and case law as legitimate and legal. It should be noted that the recognition of the legitimacy of parallel imports is based, inter alia, on the doctrine of exhaustion in commercial law.  According to this doctrine, the trademark owner is entitled to enjoy only the fruits of the first sale of the product.  In this way, his rights as the owner of the trademark are limited and do not control further sales.  In Israeli case law, it has been held that the extraction doctrine is applied even when the trademark owner sold the product abroad (see at length on this subject in the Tommy Hilfiger judgment, paras.  19-21).  In the specific market for vehicles, over the years, attempts have been made in the field of legislation and regulation in order to remove barriers that harm the profitability of parallel imports, in order to promote competition in the vehicle market and promote lower prices for consumers.  Thus, for example, in the judgment in the Union Motors case, it was held that the purpose of section 49(a) of the Licensing Law is to enable vehicles arriving in Israel through a parallel importer to exercise the vehicle's warranty with the direct importer.
41. Even in the framework of the present proceeding, there is no dispute between the parties on this matter per se, and the disputes between the parties deal, as detailed above, with regard to the manner in which this activity was implemented by the defendants, and this dealt with a number of main disputes:

The first is whether the defendants infringed the trademarks, given the protection of 'true use';