If you missed the news back in 2017, Oracle is donating the Java EE specification to the Eclipse foundation. This decision has followed a rather long period of hibernation in the specification process where people rightfully suspected a loss of strategic interest in Java EE by Oracle. At first, the decision to donate the specification was well-met by the Java EE and broader Java community. Without Oracle slowing down the process, those involved in Java EE could once again attempt to close up to non-standardized APIs. Until today, the donation process was, however, incomplete due to Oracle and the Eclipse Foundation being in disagreement about several details of the donation being made.
While turning over all intellectual property, Oracle was less generous when it comes to the use of its Java brand within the specification’s new home. Java EE does, of course, contain the name of the open-source, yet trademark-protected platform that is owned by Oracle. And this renders a problem in a legal context: If you grant a third party the use of your brand's name, you have yielded rights to restrict it in the future. To make things worse, you are potentially weakening your position in court when it comes to lawsuits regarding your brand. With the history of Oracle and Google arguing about Java licensing for years, one could, therefore, have anticipated that branding would be a difficult discussion point. And without pretending to know much about international trademark law, I was told by people more involved that "use it or lose it" is a good enough approximation for understanding the general motto of such disagreements. As a first result, the specification was therefore renamed from Java EE to Jakarta EE to avoid a clash of interests.