I hope my question in the title is clear enough and sorry if this question had been asked before.

Just wondering if Marklin has to pay some royalties for patent of locomotives, coaches, wagons, etc to all original manufacturer or railway companies that they're making. Probably at the least they are asking for permission for using the design/brand right?

I am asking this because I'm wondering if there are manufacturers out there who are not willing to let their train design in MRR or maybe railway companies who dislike the idea of using their business brand. If so, is this why weren't/aren't there many classic GM-EMD, French TGV Duplex, British trains, etc.

Thank you all, enjoy your weekend and don't forget to buy more MRR stuff.....

Nevw, can I ask what are those guys in Brisbane have been doing with the name of UP that they need to get a permission? For MRR?

Thanks.

UP's corporate lawyers apparently had nothing better to do with their time as well as having legal directors who clearly had the heads up their collective asses, not being able to do anything to actually benefit the company they worked for, so a few years ago, as the story above corroborates, they decided to AGGRESSIVELY pursue and maybe even maliciously attack the model RR industry for copyright infringement (for making MODEL trains with the UP likeness, decals, etc). These lowlifes corporate attorneys even tried to claim company rights were being infringed on stuff like WW2 planes like the F6F Hellcat, bought and paid for by taxpayers 60 years ago.
They weren't alone, sleazebag lawyers of the same ilk working for Boeing/MacDOug, Grumman also tried to pull the same stunt against plastic model makers. I think there were also some working for either GDLS or the people building the Stryker who tried the same BS.

I have doubts if the corporate leadership really knew how out of control and incompetent their legal departments were and what atrocious public relations and image it created (or entities like the UP).
Just my opinion, there are too many people going to law school, which in turns lowers the overall quality of the output (the schools don't want to flunk too many people out, that would mean less eventual cash donations!), going into a profession which too often does very little to advance human civilization.


I'm not saying there should not be some sort of licensing or approval of product (the company has every right to protect its name and image, and not let it get out into hands that would seek to do damage), but these attorneys wanted to collect absolutley ridiculous fees from the model makers. it was not a flat fee, but a pretty big % for every model produced/sold.
I think in the end it became a small flat fee that most model makers could afford, because this ended up as extremely bad publicity for UP.

If a product or name brand is that good, wouldn't a company/corporation want people to emulate it free of cost? Makes no sense to me to punish the little guy for modeling memories of his childhood or preserving history from the observers' collective perspective.

THey are THe Union Pacific Model Railway Club. They had to have a Licence to use Name and Logo

You should not mix up patent royalties with license fees.

Märklin for example paid royalties to Lenz for the automatic analog detection circuit in conjunction with their high performance decoders (this was also the reason to deliver their later DELTA decoders without this feature) and they paid a (one time) license fee for the usage of the CIWL logo with their corresponding train set #24754.

Regarding to mfx another contract related to this topic exists between Märklin and ESU.

I can't answer that either.

But there are more parties involved:
Siemens built the train, but the name ICE and the DB logo are properties of Deutsche Bahn.
So it could be they have to pay Siemens for the shape and DB for name, logo and livery.

If DB would by AGV trains, these would be called ICE in Germany ...

The name Taurus is owned by ÖBB.

If there were payments, then they would probably be for items sold - so I don't think that these payments (if they are made) have an effect on the choice of locos we have.

It's just that they have to produce huge quantities - and too many variations result in lower quantities and higher prices.