Qivive client at the Plagiarius 2025
On 7 February, the winners of the 2025 award were announced at a press conference at the Frankfurt consumer goods fair ‘Ambiente’. Since 1977, the Aktion Plagiarius e.V. has been awarding the negative prize annually to manufacturers and retailers of particularly brazen imitations and counterfeits. The aim is to protect the innovative strength and intellectual property of companies and creatives.
The trophy for this negative award is a black dwarf with a golden nose. The latter symbolises the profits that unimaginative imitators make at the expense of creative industries and industry.
This year, the third prize went to a French company in the Lyon area that had copied a greeting card motif by the artist Jörg Mohme without permission and used it for a 35-part porcelain series.
Qivive had represented the artist in court for many years and was able to enforce substantial claims for damages after years of litigation.
Jörg Mohme summed up in his acceptance speech at the press conference for the award ceremony:
‘After nine years, which required a great deal of patience, nerves and very good lawyers, the legal dispute was finally settled in my favour in February 2024, the plagiarising company was convicted and the protectability of my work was fully recognised. [...]
I would like to thank everyone who has supported me with advice and assistance. In particular, my friends in France who discovered the porcelain and my lawyers Gordian Deger, Thomas Decara, Nathalie Rose and François Cornut.
Many thanks to Aktion Plagiarius, whose efforts have made the public aware of the audacity of intellectual property thieves.
The eulogy for the award winners was given by Dr Maria Skottke-Klein, Vice President of the German Patent and Trade Mark Office (DPMA). She also emphasised once again how important it is to raise public awareness of the problem of product and brand piracy and thus to make consumers in particular aware of the need to reject fake products: because where there is no buyer, there is no market.
Anyone who buys a counterfeit product may also endanger their health, whether it is because a piece of clothing contains harmful substances, a spare part or a children's toy has not been tested, or a medication has been incorrectly dosed.
In 2025, the products honoured with the negative prize once again demonstrate the enormous range of industries affected by counterfeiting: from a bicycle basket to an insect bite healer to a radiator grille. Counterfeiters did not even stop at children's toys and tools.
Press releases of the ceremony & excerpt of the speech by Dr Maria Skottke-Klein
Many thanks to Christine Lacroix, the German Patent and Trade Mark Office (DPMA) and all other participants for their commitment to this important and valuable public relations work.
From 14 February 2025, this year's prizewinners and more than 350 other exhibits (each original and a copy in direct comparison) will be on display at the Museum Plagiarius in Solingen. Be sure to stop by!
