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Apple hasn’t seemed to have learned from its last legal battle over the Mac name that trademarks are costly to tamper with.

The start of this year proved quite a nuisance for Apple, having to battle against Cisco to rightfully call their product the ‘iPhone’. From the outset, it looked as though Apple had covered their tracks by not actually engraving the name of the phone on the back of the handset, and because they are a massive company whose reputation covers them from faults such as this, the Cisco battle seemed a minor problem, something which Apple would have no problems sorting out. But it looks as though this isn’t the only time they have been caught out over trademark issues.

According to the biography of former Apple CEO John Sculley, Odyssey: Pepsi to Apple, Jobs launched the Mac in 1984 even though the “Mac” trademark belonged to another company. In amongst the pages of his book, Scully states that the Al (Eisenstat, Apple's general counsel) had argued at full volume that Steve should pick another name for the computer. Sculley doesn’t name the other company, but says “Steve prevailed, but it ultimately cost us nearly $2 million in out-of-court settlements.”

The other company appears to be Management and Computer Services inc, a small software company based in Philadelphia.

To settle the trademark infringement, Apple paid out an undisclosed sum according to a Jan. 24 report from the Associated Press:

"Apple Computer Inc. will pay an undisclosed sum to Management and Computer Services Inc. to settle a trademark-infringement lawsuit, the companies said today. The software company sued Apple for using 'Mac' to describe items associated with its Macintosh personal computer. Management and Computer Services uses 'Macs' as a trademark."

But this isn’t all! Apple also had to pay McIntosh Labs to use the name. Early Mac literature says "Licensed from McIntosh Laboratories, Inc.", but that all changed when Apple bought rights to the name outright. At the time prior to launch, the Macintosh name was such a respectable name and adored by all, that Apple paid McIntosh Labs a never disclosed amount of money for use of the name.

From the looks of things, it makes you wonder who else Apple have ‘bought’ their names from, and if there is any underlying legal battles waiting to rear their heads.