Draft Revision to China’s Trademark Regulation

The China Nationwide Mental Property Administration (CNIPA) has published a draft revision to China’s Trademark Regulation and referred to as for feedback from the general public. On this publish and others that may comply with, we’ll take a look at essentially the most important proposed revisions and think about how they could impression overseas companies. As we speak we start by some proposed adjustments relating to the definition of what constitutes a trademark and absolutely the grounds for the refusal of a trademark utility.

In the intervening time, China’s Trademark Regulation defines emblems as “any indicators, together with phrases, graphs, letters, numbers, three-dimensional symbols, coloration combos, sound or any mixture thereof, which are able to distinguishing the products of a pure individual, authorized individual or different group from these of others could also be utilized for registration as emblems.” The draft revision of the legislation would see the addition of the time period “different parts” (其他要素) to the listing above, paving the best way for the registration of different kinds of indicators, similar to scents and position marks.

Article 10 of the present legislation prohibits the registration of marks “detrimental to socialist ethics or customs, or having different unwholesome influences”. The draft revision would see language added to the related clause, to incorporate marks which are dangerous to the “wonderful Chinese language conventional tradition” (中华优秀传统文化). Such a prohibition might be an issue for manufacturers that incorporate sure Chinese language cultural icons into their emblems, even when there isn’t a intention to offend.

Lastly, the present Article 11 prohibits registering the “generic identify, picture, or mannequin quantity” of a product. The draft revision would moreover prohibit registering the “technical time period” (技术术语的) of a product, offering additional readability.

In future posts, we’ll be different doable adjustments underneath the draft revision, together with some that would see more durable measures in opposition to bad-faith registrations and protections for well-known emblems.