Microsoft Challenges Company Over Trademark

Savvysoft, a New York City-based financial software company is facing a trademark infringement challenge by Microsoft over the use of the term "Excel." The company's new product, TurboExcel, speeds up Excel spreadsheets as much as 300 times, secures and protects proprietary spreadsheet methodologies, and makes Excel spreadsheets instantly portable to other systems, including those running on Linux. "Microsoft has never been granted a registered trademark on Excel," said Rich Tanenbaum, founder of Savvysoft. "In fact, they waited 19 years just to apply. Plus, there are over a hundred third-party products with Excel in their name," continued Tanenbaum. "In fact, Microsoft's own website actually offers downloads of over a dozen products with Excel in their name that are offered by third-parties. As any trademark lawyer will tell you, when you've got a trademark, and you let other companies use it, you lose it." Tanenbaum noted Microsoft's own