In the extremely competitive market such as nowaday, a product or service can be identified and selected by customers is the important thing for the activity of the company. Besides the quality of products or services, owning an unique and attracting trademark is also one thing that all the company should care about.
So, what is the trademark, owning a trademark and registering it gives the company which benefits?
First of all, the trademark is one of objects that is protected by the intellectual property law, Trademarks belong to the group of industrial property rights defined in the Intellectual Property Law.
According to clause 16, Article 4 of the Intellectual Property Law, “a trademark means any sign used to distinguish products or services of different organizations or individuals, these signs may be in letters, numbers, figures, colors, etc. or a combination of the above factors to express the nature and spirit of the product / service it represents. In particular, the trademark needs to show its ability to distinguish it from others”.
2. What kinds of benefits the company gets from trademark registration?
Owning and registering the trademark brings a lot of benefits to the enterprises:
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- The registration of trademark protection represents the recognition and protection of Goverment throughout the territory of Vietnam with the registered trademark. On that basis, the enterprises are protected from copying or faking their products based on the trademarks of the enterprises.
- In addition to being legally recognized and protected, enterprises are able to use that trademark to carry out advertising and introducing products to consumers legally to expand their market, create the trust of customers when using products / services
- Registering the trademark to avoid distinguishing from other similar products in the market. The reputation or the market of the enterprise might be lost by this confusion and there is no mechanism to request to deal with breaches of regulations on use of the trademark.
- The trademark is also accepted as a valuable asset for transferring (licensing, franchising,..), raising capital from investors. Thereby developing the scale and profitability of the enterprise.
4. Procedure to register trademark
To be register for the protection, the trademark needs to meet a number of general conditional:
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- It is a visible sign in the form of letters, words, drawings or images including holograms, or a combination thereof, represented in one or more colours.;
- It is capable of distinguishing goods or services of the mark owner from those of other subjects.
The trademark registration is implemented by following step:
Step 1:
Send the dossier to the NOIP (National Office of Intellectual Property of Vietnam) or their representative office in Ho Chi Minh city or in Da Nang.
The required documents:
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- Declaration for registration (2 copies)
- 10 trademark samples clearly showing their colors, designs, .. with sizes not exceeding 80mmx80mm..
- Receipt of fees and charges
In addition, some documents may be added such as:
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- Letter of authorization
- Documents certify the use of special signs (if the trademark contains symbols, flags and badges of domestic and international agencies, organizations, etc.);
- Document certify registration rights;
- Documents certify the enjoyment of registration rights from others;
- Document prove the priority (if the application has a claim for priority)
Step 2:
After the NOIP receives the application, they will conduct an examination of the form and content of the trademark registration application:
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- Formal examination: 01 month. If it has any mistakes in the application, NOIP will send an announcement to the applicant to fix all the mistakes within 01 month from the day the announcement has been received.
- Publication of valid application: within 2 months from the date the application has The decision to accept the valid application
- Content examination: no more than 09 months from the date of publication of the valid application (may be extended for not more than 3 months if requested from the applicant).
In this period, NOIP may request applicant to provide explation for the application, or applicant may send requirement to add or modify the application.
Step 3:
If the trademark meets the conditions for granting the certification, the NOIP shall issue an annoucement of intention to grant the certificate and proceed to grant the certificate when the applicant has fully paid the fees within 03 months since the date of receiving the notice.
However, in reality, the time limit for examining dossiers of the NOIP may be extended from 1 to 2 years due to overcrowding of protection registration applications.
To save time learning about the law, filling out forms, waiting to submit the dossier, you can contact HTLaw for advice and support for Register trademark legal services.
Contact us
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- Email: hue.truong@htlaw.vn
- Phone number: +84 935 439 454.