Studying and Formulating Regulations to Specify the Range of Penalties for Malicious Registered Trademarks

Song Jianhua, Director of the Articles and Laws Department of the State Intellectual Property Office, said that the Intellectual Property Office was studying and formulating "Some Regulations on Regulating the Application for Registration of Trademarks" and had asked for public opinions. The contents of "Several Provisions" include the specific application and considerations of Article 4 of the Trademark Law, as well as the applied situation of warning and fines for malicious registration.

The National Intellectual Property Administration held a regular press conference in the third quarter on the morning of September. At the meeting, Song Jianhua responded to the "Progress in the Amendment of Trademark Law".

Song Jianhua pointed out that the revised Trademark Law in 2013 played an important role in protecting the exclusive right to use trademarks and promoting the economical society development. However, in recent years, some problems have arisen in the process of implementation, such as the complicated procedure of trademark confirmation; the malicious application for the purpose of "mimicking famous brands" and the action of hoarding registration for the purpose of transfer and profit-making, which have seriously disturbed the order of market economy and trademark management system. The protection of trademark exclusive rights also needs to be strengthened.

Song Jianhua said that in order to effectively regulate malicious applications and hoarding registration, strengthen the protection of trademark exclusive rights and create a good business environment, on April 23 this year, the Standing Committee of the National People's Congress adopted a decision on Amending the Trademark Law of the People's Republic of China, focusing on regulating malicious applications, hoarding registration and other acts. The trademark law has also been amended for increasing the penalty for infringement behavior of the exclusive right to use trademarks. The amendment will come into effect on November 1, 2019.

Song Jianhua introduced that in order to further implement and refine the latest amendments to the Trademark Law, the Intellectual Property Office is studying and formulating the departmental regulations "Several Provisions on Standardizing Trademark Application for Registration". The contents of "Several Provisions" include the specific application and considerations of Article 4 of the Trademark Law, as well as the application of warning and fines for malicious registration, and the scope of fines. Next, the Intellectual Property Office will continue to promote preparations for a new round of comprehensive correction of the Trademark Law. By evaluating the implementation of the Trademark Law and conducting thematic argumentation on hot issues of social concern, the Intellectual Property Office will revise and improve the Trademark Law to better serve the social development.

August 8, 2019

Source: Xinhua Net

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