Sports     

Jeremy Lin trademark looks like savvy move

Shanghai Daily, February 22, 2012

• Jeremy Lin. [File photo]

  
  
  

  The rising fame and commercial value enjoyed by American Chinese basketball player Jeremy Lin with his sudden ascent in the NBA may pay off for a businesswoman in eastern China's Jiangsu Province, as she registered Lin's name as a trademark last year, a local newspaper reported.

  Yu Minjie, owner of a sportswear company in the city of Wuxi, saw Lin on television in 2010. With a strong commercial sense, Yu believed Lin would become another Yao Ming and soon applied for a trademark of "Jeremy S.H.L" with the Chinese characters of Lin Shu-How.

  Yu registered Jeremy S.H.L in two categories - clothing and toys - and both were approved by the Trademark Office of the State Administration for Industry & Commerce of China last August. The application cost Yu 4,460 yuan (US$708) in total.

  With Lin's eye-opening performances for the NBA's New York Knicks this season, the value of his name is also rising - to an estimated 100 million yuan, according to a recent study by Forbes magazine.

  Lin was not the first basketball player's name to be registered as trademark by Yu's company. The ambitious woman previously registered such young players as Zhou Qi and Ban Duo as brands but these players never gained fame. Yu even registered the Chinese translation of Lin's teammate Carmelo Anthony as a trademark.

  Lin himself applied on Monday to register the trademark "Linsanity" in the United States, according to previous reports. The application applies to clothes, underwear, toys and backpacks.

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