The Tesla Cybercab Just Got Smacked Down By The Feds—And Not How You

• Tesla failed to register the Cybercab trademark ahead of its unveiling.
• Another company beat Tesla to filing for the trademark.
• The USPTO has suspended Tesla’s application until the other company decides to register or drop the Cybercab name claim.

Move fast and break things is the typical Silicon Valley mantra. Unfortunately for Tesla, so is talking big before taking action in a timely manner (ahem, Full Self-Driving and Robotaxis). That second piece brought forth a slip-up which may have cost Tesla big: the Cybercab name.

A delay in filing paperwork led the United States Patent and Trademark Office to suspending Tesla’s application to register the Cybercab trademark ahead of the vehicle’s launch. The reason? Someone else beat them to the punch.

Photo by: Tesla

According to a government filing spotted by Electrek, a french beverage company called Unibev filed for the Cybercab trademark several weeks ahead of Tesla, meaning that it’s first in line. Unibev even applied to use the name for vehicles, just like Tesla did.

It turns out that when Tesla unveiled the Cybercab on October 10, 2024 and CEO Elon Musk name-dropped the product, Tesla hadn’t yet actually filed a trademark application. Unibev decided to move in and filed for the trademark itself nearly three weeks later on October 28. Tesla filed with the USPTO the following month.

“Action on this application is suspended until the prior-filed application(s) below either registers or abandons,” the USPTO wrote in a letter to Tesla.

The USPTO requires that trademarks be distinct, have no conflicts with other trademarks, used in commerce (or has intent to be) and has the capability to be a “source identifier”—meaning that consumers can easily pinpoint that word to a brand. Because Unibev filed for the trademark ahead of Tesla’s registration, it takes precedence and, if granted, Tesla’s use of Cybercab wouldn’t tick at least one of those boxes. To be sure, Unibev doesn’t own the trademark yet, as its application is still listed as pending. 

What’s odd is that Unibev seems to have played this game with Tesla before. The company holds three trademarks for beverages named “Teslaquila,” the name the automaker once tried to use for its limited-run liquor. (Tesla eventually abandoned that branding, but because of Mexican regulators not any trademark squatting.)

But the Cybercab nameplate is definitely a bigger deal in the grand scheme of things for the automaker. This is the two-seat, steering wheel-free autonomous pod that is supposed to catapult Tesla into the future. And Tesla aims to start making them at scale this year. 

This isn’t exactly a death sentence for the Cybercab name. These types of trademark disputes do happen. Tesla could challenge it, or even potentially negotiate a financial remedy with Unibev. 

From the outside, it feels like Tesla was unprepared to launch its product—but when the company has made so many abrupt pivots and promises around the Cybercab and related platforms, it’s not really surprising. Regardless, it is a bad look for Tesla to have its hallmark product name usurped by a company unrelated company.