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LONDON -There ugg boot shoes aren't many obstacles in the way of Chinese search engine Baidu.com, which has proved hugely successful at muscling in on a world dominated by Google. That is, apart from a tiny Dutch Internet company that owns the name "Baidu Europe." Baidu Europe, a ugg sundance boots Groningen, Netherlands-based Internet company with eight employees, is putting its brand name and 17 domain names (baidu.eu, baidu.tv and baidu.me, baidu.nl etc) up for grabs to the highest bidder. The company hopes to begin the bidding at 1.2 million euros ($1.7 million), says Alphons Geerlings, the founder ugg sundance ii boots of Demerkplaats , an Amsterdam-based trademark firm representing Baidu Europe. The company was set up in 2003 and chose the name of Baidu because it means "near you" in the local dialect, Baidu Europe managing director Peter Ufkes told Forbes.com.

While the company has ugg sundance ii chestnut clung onto the name for the past five years, recent confusion over the two companies, when the Chinese Baidu decided to have itself represented by a Dutch company in Europe, it decided the time was right to sell. "The mounting popularity of the Asian Baidu, which has grown into the world's third-biggest search engine, the launch of new services such as Baidu TV--the domain name baidu.tv is already owned by Baidu Europe--and the Chinese company's activities related to the Olympic ugg classic argyle knit Games are making it very difficult to differentiate between the two companies," Ufkes said.

Baidu Europe has had no contact with the Beijing-based Baidu.com (nasdaq: BIDU - news - people ), according to Geerlings. So far only a Brazilian-based Internet company has expressed ugg classic argyle knit boot interest. "We are not planning to approach the Asian Baidu. We expect it to come to us," said Geerlings.

Navigating the complex and multi-jurisdictional world of trademark and domain names can be a massive challenge for companies, according to Graham Robinson, the managing director of Farncombe International, an investigation agency that deals with the protection of international property rights. "There are so many generic top level ugg classic argyle knit sale domains such as dot com, dot net and dot tv, and if a brand owner wants complete coverage of a new name it has to … hundreds of these domains."

Trademark registration can be equally complicated, with metallic ugg boots on sale marketing departments often jumping the gun before the trademark registration procedures have been launched, leaving firms vulnerable to companies snapping up those names in the hope of selling them again for a tidy profit. Exactly why Baidu Europe did not challenge Baidu.com in Europe is unclear, though Geerlings says it's an option it would still consider. "When you start a company, making a legal challenge is not always the first priority."

Robinson metallic ugg boots uk has another explanation: "The reason may simply be that it knows it can make an awful lot of money by selling the brand rather than spending money on protecting the brand."wjj