• April 7, 2004

A London-based investment research firm says it owns the trademark to "Gmail," the same name of Google's highly touted email product, and it intends to keep the name.

The company, the Market Age, claims that at its peak a year ago it had 1,000 customers representing 300 banks signed up for "Pronet," a web-based research application service, which includes "Gmail" as a primary research product.

Google, which is already under fire from privacy advocacy groups who are concerned with Gmail's design, now faces another challenge in launching the product.