RIM, which is in deep trouble with its customers after a huge outage last week, is facing a potential trademark lawsuit over the name of its upcoming BlackBerry platform.

Earlier this week, RIM unveiled the new name for its next-generation BlackBerry platform at its fourth annual BlackBerry Developer Conference (DevCon) in San Francisco. Dubbed BBX, Rim hoped the new operating system would encourage developers to write for the outfit.

The name was a combination of the names "BlackBerry" and "QNX." RIM bough QNX last year, and its BlackBerry PlayBook tablet OS and the upcoming smartphone OS are based on a QNX operating system. BBX sounded a bit like "BBM" which is the BlackBerry Messenger and although it also sounded like BBW tubby lovers were not likely to be confused.

Software company BASIS is currently filing legal action against RIM, claiming the name BBX violates its trademarks.
BASIS's "BBx" operating system independent language, database, and toolset is an "OS-agnostic language that runs on numerous OSs, Java platforms, and JavaScript-enabled browsers" according to the company. Unfortunately it owns a trademark on the name "BBX” and, yes, its customers are confused.

RIM responded to the initial complaint saying that it did not think that themarks are confusing, particularly since our respective companies are in different lines of business. We are surprised though that it did not check.