Do you have a big screen at your house? Then how much do you value it? Well, that television set in your house, complete with a trademark that you have always prized, could be fake! This is according to the Anti-Counterfeit Agency (ACA), which has passed a warning to all Kenyans.
ACA’s deputy director enforcement and legal services, Johnson Adera said on Tuesday that the influx of fake TV sets in the market was posing a major challenge.
He cautioned that many TV sets that were being packaged and passed off as highly valued trademarks, were actually assembled using bogus parts. Did you know this?
“We have seized a container of counterfeit television sets worth Sh28 million at the Inland Container Depot in Embakasi, Nairobi,” he said.
Mr Adera warned Kenyans to be cautious when buying TV sets and other electronic items including speakers and car stereos.
He said fakes were being passed off as products by highly regarded brands. Mr Adera, who said most of the TV sets had genuine-looking logos, called upon Kenyans who suspect the integrity of their TV sets to report to the agency.
“We have to be vigilant at all times because counterfeiters are creative,” he said.
Mr Adera was speaking at a ceremony where ACA, the body tasked with detection of counterfeits, was being feted for Intellectual Property Rights Enforcement by Dolby Laboratories in Nairobi on Tuesday.
Dolby is an audio compression technologies developer. The award was in recognition of the work the authority has done in protecting their intellectual property rights.
Dolby is in Kenya to train surveillance officers attached to the ACA and the multiagency team set up to fight counterfeit products on their products and the intellectual property rights of their trademark.
Speaking during the event, Vivian Vassallo, Global Director, IP Protection & Enforcement, Dolby Laboratories Inc. said that they were delighted to have a strategic partner in ACA to work with in reducing the counterfeits menace.