The US company OpenAI, known for ChatGPT, has lost its legal challenge at the EU's General Court regarding its "OPENAI" trademark application. The court ruled that for certain software and IT goods/services, the term is descriptive and lacks the necessary distinctiveness for trademark protection.

This decision upholds a previous rejection by the EU Intellectual Property Office (EUIPO), which found that "open" implies freely accessible and "AI" refers to open artificial intelligence. OpenAI argued "open" has multiple meanings and "OPENAI" is a coined term. They also pointed to similar trademarks granted elsewhere.

The court dismissed these arguments, stating the word combination isn't linguistically unusual in English and that registrations in other countries are not binding in the EU. The ruling can still be appealed to the European Court of Justice.