Sconnect Media to protect rights of “Wolfoo” in the US

	Wolfoo product sets certificated as standard content
	Sconnect Vietnam files lawsuits against Entertainment One

According to the London Daily Post, Sconnect Media LLC (authorized by Sconnect Vietnam) is currently reviewing legal procedures to protect Wolfoo's interests in the United States. Mr. Ta Manh Hoang is the owner representative of both Sconnect Vietnam and Sconnect Media LLC (USA).

Sconnect Vietnam (Headquartered in Hanoi) is the owner of animated character set Wolfoo, while Entertainment ONE UK LTD (EO/eOne - headquartered in London, Britain) is the owner of animated character set Peppa Pig.

Since the beginning of 2022, these two businesses have filed lawsuits against each other in the courts of the Russian Federation, the United Kingdom and Vietnam due to an intellectual property right dispute between Wolfoo and Peppa Pig. The cause was that eOne sued Sconnect in courts in Russia and the UK with the reason that "The Wolfoo character set is a remake of the Peppa Pig character set". At the same time, repeatedly hitting the Wolfoo copyright on YouTube and being accepted by YouTube resulted in millions of dollars in damage to Sconnect.

After copyrighting Wolfoo on YouTube and Facebook, most recently, eOne continued to copyright Wolfoo channel on TikTok and complain about Wolfoo Game copyright on Apple Store, even though Wolfoo Game is a product unrelated to the dispute. However, the copyright claim of eOne was not accepted by TikTok and Apple.

On October 12th, 2022, Vietnam Digital Communications Association (VDCA) stood up to protect the business rights of Sconnect on YouTube. Therefore, VDCA requested YouTube to ensure the fairness of business rights between Vietnam companies and British companies. TechTimes (On November 7th, 2022) quoted Mr. Nguyen Xuan Cuong, Vice President of VDCA:” If Wolfoo’s videos are locked due to being sued in Britain then Peppa Pig videos in this case in Vietnam should be locked by YouTube as well”.

The leader of VDCA added: “Sconnect should take any actions immediately to protect the benefits of Wolfoo in the US’ business market”.

Earlier in July, Sconnect won the case filed by eOne in the Moscow City Court. The court subsequently ended eOne's case and prevented them from filing similar lawsuits against Sconnect in the future.

Despite this victory, YouTube still approved eOne's request to remove Wolfoo video. Not allowing Wolfoo to upload new content caused Wolfoo's monthly views to drop by more than 60%, causing massive damage in subscriber rates, business reputation, and a drop in revenue. Although Sconnect made every effort to provide a complete claim file and asked to respect the decision of the Moscow Court, YouTube did not consider Sconnect's appeal.

In January, 2022, eOne again filed a lawsuit against Sconnect in the UK, but the court in this country has not yet accepted the case.

Wolfoo is producted at Sconnect's studio

On October 24, 2022, in a self-declaration at the London Court (United Kingdom), eOne testified that: “YouTube is very supportive in removing Wolfoo videos. eOne requests the Court in the UK to ban Wolfoo from appearing on the YouTube platform.” However, at the latest hearing on November 3, 2022, the London Court has not yet issued any ruling. That is, up to now, eOne's lawsuit in the UK has not been accepted by the Court and has no legal value.

So far, the dispute between the two sides has not had any court declaring Wolfoo copyright infringement; No court has ordered any restraints or restrictions on Wolfoo. But Vietnam's cartoon system has been severely damaged on YouTube, because 3 diamond channels and 3 other channels with millions of subscribers were blocked by YouTube from uploading new videos. Not only is the view decline, Wolfoo is also at risk that users will leave the channel if it continues to be unable to upload new content.

Wolfoo animated videos (about 2,700 episodes) are translated into 17 languages, broadcast on many platforms such as YouTube, Facebook, Tiktok; television platforms, online platforms of many other countries around the world. Wolfoo has registered trademarks and copyrights in the United States, Russia, Vietnam and many other countries.