Company Overview

Client:Entertainment

Our client is one of the most successful animation studios in the world, whose storybook characters are hugely popular and easily recognized. Their trademark and copyrights have been licensed worldwide, yet they found that both had been widely infringed.

The studio began spotting unlicensed products featuring their characters across marketplaces such as AliExpress, DHGate, and Wish. Most of it was tied to sellers based in China, making enforcement more complicated and requiring specialized e-commerce counterfeit detection strategies.

Starting Point

The client’s most significant challenge here was jurisdiction.

They needed to identify who was behind the sales, enforce across multiple platforms, and ideally recover lost value. But their internal team couldn’t handle this on the scale, especially across so many marketplaces and jurisdictions.

And they didn’t want just to react. They sought long-term results, including removals and financial recovery, through effective IP protection strategies.

Solution

We partnered with the animation studio to deploy a multi-layered brand protection program centered around our platform.

Through our investigation, we uncovered the individuals behind counterfeit activity in more than 40 online marketplaces (not just the listings, but the people and networks driving them). We paired this with targeted legal action and cross-border coordination, which allowed us to go beyond basic removals and directly recover assets.

The client had full visibility throughout. Every step, from identified sellers to enforcement results, was clearly reported through our Xcore dashboard. They could see where the issues were, what actions were taken, and what the results were.

Results

Over 100,000 counterfeit units were removed from circulation, with a 98% takedown success rate through our comprehensive e-commerce takedown process. Notably, the client received direct compensation from the counterfeiters through asset seizure and legal follow-up.

Beyond the removals, the studio experienced a measurable increase in authorized sales and new inbound license requests, thanks to a cleaner online footprint and the removal of high-volume infringers from key channels.

Why This Worked (and What Other Brands Can Learn)

If you manage licensed IP across multiple markets, especially in categories such as character merchandise, toys, or collectibles, counterfeit detection doesn’t just undermine brand integrity. It can directly impact sales, confuse your partners, and slow down future licensing deals.

This animation studio gained online brand protection, recovered value through enforcement, and regained control over its online brand appearance using professional trademark protection services.

If you’re not sure where the risks are coming from, a Risk Report is the best place to start. It gives you a clear picture of who’s using your brand and where, before the damage is done.