trademark & design management news

Both Austrian national designs as well as Registered Community Designs with EU-wide protection can initially be filed without disclosure (i.e. secret applications). This means that their publication will be deferred. Secret design applications generally make sense if the applicant is interested in keeping a design undisclosed for as long as possible. The precise national and EU-wide regulations are not completely uniform.

What do the terms "novelty" and "individual character" mean and why are they so important?

As mentioned in our blog post of 23 April 2024 (link), several criteria must be met to ensure the legal validity of a design registration.

Designating designs

As we already noted in our blog article of 19 March 2024 (link), intellectual property covers more than "just" trademarks. A design is particularly recommendable if the external appearance of a product or part of it is to be protected.

The Moldovan Parliament adopted the new Law on Trademarks No. 25 of 15 February 2024 (the "New Trademarks Act"). The law was published in the Moldovan Official Gazette on 2 April 2024 and will enter into force on 2 April 2027. It is envisaged that the New Trademarks Act will eliminate the discrepancies with the EU aquis in this respect. Accordingly, the law transposes Directive 2004/48/EC of the European Parliament and of the Council of 29 April 2004 on the enforcement of intellectual property rights, Directive (EU) 2015/2436 of the European Parliament and of the Council of 16 December 2015 to approximate the laws of the Member States relating to trademarks, and, partially, Regulation (EU) 2017/1001 of the European Parliament and of the Council of 14 June 2017 on the European Union trademark.

When developing or refining a product, including its branding, a lot of time and money are invested in creating something unique that customers will need and love. To protect this financial and creative investment, legislators have decided to grant certain monopoly rights or intellectual property (IP) rights. So, how do you determine the appropriate type of protection for your product? In our blog (link) we have mainly discussed trademark protection. But trademark law is broader than you might expect. Besides the "name" of a product, other features such as the shape, the colouring or a sound can be protected as long as they are recognised as an indication of origin and no absolute ground for refusal, like the technical functionality of the feature, applies. Still, trademark law "merely" protects indications of origin. Fortunately, there are also other IP rights that should be considered as part of a protection strategy.

If you want to protect your trademark, there are a few things to consider:

• How exactly will the trademark be used?
• For which goods and/or services?
• And – today's topic – where?

Registering and monitoring your trademark are important tools to protect your trademark. It is also important to make sure to properly use the trademark and to indicate to the public that a word, logo or other sign functions as your trademark by marking it accordingly.

When developing a new brand, it is important to determine well before using the trademark and filing a trademark application whether there are any earlier conflicting trademark rights that could block use or registration. Trademark searches help to identify possibly conflicting earlier trademark rights and to better assess the risk associated with using and registering the brand.

The priority principle in trademark law states that in the event of a conflict between two trademarks, the older right always prevails. As a rule, therefore, a trademark owner cannot defend themselves by claiming to be the owner of a later trademark.

Have you recently acquired another company or some assets like a trademark or even an entire trademark portfolio? Has your company merged with another company? Or has it changed its name or address? Then don't forget to enter the change in the corresponding Trademark Register.

Unlike national applications, which are protected only in a single country, the EU trademark offers protection in all member states of the European Union. Even if an obstacle to protection exists in only one member state of the EU or if owners of prior rights in a single country feel disturbed by the application, protection for the entire EU trademark is at risk due to the unitary effect. Thus, applicants for trademarks in the European Union often face a problem when the Office refuses to grant protection to a trademark based on absolute or relative grounds or when third parties file an opposition or cancellation request against the trademark.

While the legalisation requirements in connection with the assignment of trademark registrations were abolished in Austria a few years ago, everybody dealing with registered IP rights around the world knows that there are notarisation and legalisation requirements for documents like powers of attorney, affidavits or deeds of assignment.

Are you the proud owner of a trademark registration? – Please keep in mind that registration alone might not always suffice to ensure protection. In most jurisdictions, after a certain period of time you must prove that you are using your trademark for the protected goods/services – either actively or at least in case of a third-party contention. Otherwise, you risk the partial or total deletion of your trademark registration from the trademark register.

Trademark registrations protect trademarks for certain products. These are to be itemised in the "list of goods and services" or the "specification". As the specification defines the scope of protection for the trademark, it is – alongside the sign for which protection is sought – the most important part of the application.

In our last blog, Michelle Duchon and Christian Schumacher reported on mandatory information for a national Austrian trademark application.

But how quickly can you get a trademark registered? With the fast-track application, it is possible to register a trademark within 10 working days.

To file a national trademark application with the Austrian IP Office, mandatory information must be entered in an online form. While this sounds simple, several aspects should be considered to avoid problems.

You are well advised to, but in principle there is no legal requirement to register your trademark in the European Union. There are several good reasons to file a trademark application.

Crucial amendments to the Hungarian Trademark Act entered into force on 1 January 2023. This Legal Insight briefly describes the most important changes.

Have you ever wondered whether you can modify a registered community design ("RCD") that is challenged by an application for declaration of invalidity by removing certain prohibited design elements to maintain the registration?

Trademark professionals have noted growing interest in protecting trademarks for "virtual goods". This leaves trademark specialists as well as IP offices grappling with how to correctly classify these goods.

Change is part of everyday life. Some changes are temporary, some more permanent while we adapt to various challenges. However, particular attention should be paid to scenarios where the changes affect registered data.

You want to apply for a trademark that is visually or phonetically similar to another trademark, perhaps it even is contained as a whole. Is this possible without infringing on someone else's trademark rights?

The transitional period for the withdrawal of the United Kingdom ("UK") from the EU ("BREXIT") ended on 31 December 2020. All European Union trademarks and Community designs registered at that time were automatically cloned as national IP rights in the UK.

With the EU trademark law reform, the possibilities to defend a later trademark against an earlier trademark have been significantly expanded due to the establishment of so-called intervening rights.