On January 10, 2007, Cisco Systems filed a lawsuit against Apple, standing that Apple’s iPhone infringed on their iPhone trademark.
The two companies were in negotiation to allow Apple the rights to use the name, although the meetings came to standstill when Cisco pushed for the two products to be interoperable. Cisco alleged that Apple subsequently created a front company to try to acquire the rights another way. Following the public unveiling of the iPhone at the 2007 Macworld Expo, Cisco filed the lawsuit.
Apple claimed that there will be no confusion between the two products, and that their iPhone is the first cell phone with such a name, Cisco’s “iPhone” being a VoIP phone.On February 21, 2007, Cisco and Apple announced an agreement under which both companies would be allowed to use the iPhone name worldwide.
Courtesy: en.wikipedia.org