Fiat Panda Chinese copy banned from Europe
July 21, 2008 by Alborz Fallah
In another case which should set a precedence for Chinese manufacturers attempting to import cloned cars into Western markets, an Italian court ruled this week that the Chinese minicar produced by Chinese automaker Great Wall is banned from Europe.
The car in questions is the Great Wall Peri minicar (pictured above), which to the untrained eye, looks nearly identical to the Fiat Panda, Europe’s best selling minicar.
The Italian giant began legal action against Great Wall both in Italy and in China. The Italian court ruled that “the (GWPeri) doesn’t look like a different car but is a (Fiat) Panda with a different front end.” The court also charged Great Wall a 15,000-euro fine for the first GWPeri imported in Europe. Any further violations will cost 50,000 euros per imported car.
The case is far from over however, lawyers for Great Wall quickly noted the company will appeal the Turin court decision.
Closer to home, an outcome in a Chinese court is still pending. Fiat doesn’t sell the Panda in China, which makes it difficult for the manufacture to have the car pulled off the market. Nonetheless Fiat has strong alliances with both the Chinese government and other Chinese automakers.
Meanwhile, chinese cars are only months away from hitting our shores. Ateco, distributors of such prestige brands as Fiat, Alfa Romeo, Ferrari and Maserati are in charge of the operation. More information on that can be found here.
Print it: 
I’m not really sure if this is a good decision.
Is a car’s basic shape and design intellectual property? The front end is what characterizes a car, and they look fairly different from those photos.
Forbidding a car to sell because it looks ’similar’ is quite a big stance to make.
They have the advantages of Slave wages, the ability to set up industries and pollute the rivers and air at will, western governments that suck up to them by not imposing tariffs to compensate for the slave labour and lack of environmental laws AND they still feel the need to steal and copy!!!!!
Goes to show that their is no substitute for REAL ability and know how!!!!
Good outcome for Fiat.
No, no – we not copy, we invent, honest.
I don’t know they look quite different to me…
This is yet again blatant reverse-engineering by dodgy Chinese car manufacturers. Of course they don’t quite look the same, there has to be a few cosmetic changes to try and make them look different. Ateco should be stopped from bringing this rubbish into Australia!!!
“Goes to show that their is no substitute for REAL ability and know how!!!!”
I find this hard to believe when leveled at a car company, let alone one that has a long history of dodgy cars. There is a reason why the joke about on a quiet day you can hear the Fiats/Alfas rusting exists.
And BTW there not their…
Supercujo…….They don’t just copy Fiat’s they also copy good cars!! and that was what i was referring to!
Surely you don’t agree that these ripoffs should be rewarded???
Wonder if the courts will ban the coping of panels now – last time the car copmanies were told they could not copyright thier design
But the insurance companies would not go for that – they are happy to see your car repair using imitation – non complying parts
Our government will be too weak to stop these crappy cars coming here. They would rather see our own car industry go under than upset the chinese by telling them not to seel their junk here………..its a disgrace that these unsafe vehicles should be allowed here when the government force our car makers to spend billions of dollars to make our cars safer every year. Chinese cars equals increased road deaths.
There should be some law that prohibits new cars with less than a three (or perhaps even four) star rating from being sold here in Australia.
That would be a guaranteed way to save lives.
Fiat should begin importing the Panda into Australia to make sure that the China rip-off can never enter our shores.
am i the only one who actually prefers the chinese one.
differnet front
differnt windows [no c pilalr]
looks bettter
I’m still wondering how the hell they get away with this crap
Looks way better than the Fiat,except the badge.
The 2 cars look very different…so what next, the Toyota Yaris & Nissan Micra will be sued by Fiat too ?
If they do manage to appeal against the decision I hope us Euro folk will vote with their wallets and keep Euro folk in jobs here.
good on the italians for taking a stand, its a fiat panda with what looks like a nissan micra front end.
O – if theres no c pillar then whats holding up the back end of the roof? hehe ;)
Looks like some of the external styling has been copied from the Nissan Note, especially the rear end styling.
sorry i mean no rear window in the c pillar
No I don’t think it was the right choice Fiat. Sure there is similarities but it is easily not the same looking car.
gee, if just by having the same shape will be termed ‘copies’, there are lots of smaller cars out there that are ‘copies’ out there. An oversea friend once thought the Ford-Falcon here has the same shape as the Commodore….. gee, wonder if they ever though of call each other’s lawyers…..
You Aussies are the most racist and most prejudice and bias people in the world. Remember what you guys said about Toyota, Honda, Mitsibushi cars when they were first introduced into your country and you were condemning them and comparing them to the “superior quality” cars made by Holden,Ford and Chrysler?
If the Chinese, Korean and Japanese stop buying your coal, aluminum ore, iron ore, wheat, coal and your wool, do you think Europe or the US would buy them from you?
Wake up stupid!
Ray – The story says this cars banned in Europe,were does it say its banned in Australia???.Your prejudice is showing
Hi all, this article didn’t show the right picture, here :
http://static.blogo.it/autoblo.....tpanda.jpg
See also,
Great Wall Gwperi finally ruled as copy of Fiat Panda
http://autonews.gasgoo.com/aut.....Panda.html