Car maker files suit to stop MJ Acquisitions from using Saleen name.
07-18-09: On the eve of MJ Acquisitions, Inc getting ready to unveil the new 2010 "Saleen" Mustang at Mustang Week in Myrtle Beach, SC news has broken that Steve Saleen is filing suit to protect his name.
Steve Saleen and his company, Steve Saleen’s SMS Supercars, announced today that they have filed a lawsuit in the Superior Court in California, seeking an order directing MJ Acquisitions, Inc. to cease and desist from promoting their products under the Saleen name in any form. Concurrently, Mr. Saleen is also seeking additional, related remedies from the company that formerly carried his name. This action is an additional move to continue to protect the name, reputation and brand value of Steve Saleen, and to reassure his loyal customers, dealers and car enthusiasts that only Steve Saleen’s SMS Supercar performance vehicles and products are genuine and deserving to carry his name.
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Steve Saleen ceded control of the company he founded, Saleen, Inc., in 2003 and left it completely in the spring of 2007 without any further management association. The non-enthusiast corporate executives sold a number of assets to a company by the name of MJ Acquisitions, Inc., changed the company’s name, and in early 2009 ceased operations altogether.
In April 2009, Steve Saleen announced support for his customers and dealers affected negatively by the demise of the company that long carried his name. In a statement issued in April, he said: “The company I launched a long time ago announced it will no longer honor its product warranties, nor will the acquiring company for those assets, MJ Acquisitions, Inc. This kind of ‘customer treatment’ damages my reputation, misleads customers and cannot be left unaddressed.” Steve Saleen announced that SMS Supercars would guarantee the warranties that MJ Acquisitions abandoned.
Mr. Saleen went on to say: “It amuses me that faceless executives and wannabes are trying to misrepresent themselves as some kind of continuation of Saleen, which they are not. SMS Supercars is the true Saleen. It is the only company I endorse, the only company entitled to use my name and legacy, and the only company that carries my signature on its products, because they are my products. The legal action we have undertaken today will emphasize once and for all that the only genuine Saleen products are mine.
"There is only one Saleen" Steve Saleen told SOEC today in an exclusive interview, making clear that MJ Acquisitions only bought certain assets -- and once Hancock Park Associates, then majority owner of Saleen Inc, shut down the company; the company ceased to exist, and the use of the name reverted back to Mr. Saleen. Mr. Saleen also clarified that he never had a non-compete clause when he left the company in 2007.
