Somewhat of a tangent, but in the EU there is "brand" type protection for many types of cheese (think Parmesan), they have to come from the specified geographic area and use proper production methods, or else use a different name.

What about sodas like Dr. Pepper vs. Dr. Thunder? Do you think producing Dr. Thunder is ethically questionable from a business standpoint?

Or Oreo and Hydrox?

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hydrox

Thanks for posting; Hydrox becomes the imitator...

I don't think so personally. It is a pretty blatant ripoff of course, but Dr Pepper has also been around for a long time now (at least a century?)

I don't think copyrights/patents/whatever apply, but if you think of the principles behind them as a bit of a guide, designing a novel product should ideally let you profit off it exclusively for a while (to incentivize invention), but probably not forever (to allow competition and lower prices).