NEWS

The United States Patent and Trademark Office "three-pronged" to deal with trademark issues

Release time:

2016-10-11 15:49

Nanjing Huaxun interviewed the director in charge of trademarks of the United States Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO) and provided a "three-pronged" solution to the problems in the trademark database.

October 6, Mary. Pawnee. Dennison (Mary Boney Denison) published a blog, said the USPTO plans to make a number of changes in trademark registration matters.

Dennison said the USPTO intends to pursue a "three-pronged approach" based on the results of recent pilot projects.

In 2012, the USPTO launched the pilot program to ensure the accuracy of trademark registrations.

The project collects data that can reflect whether a registered trademark is "actually used" to register products and services.

Dennison said, "During the trial period, we required registrants to use evidence in 500 randomly selected trademark maintenance documents to prove that the trademark was used for two additional products in each registered category."

"Although the registrant must provide an example of use for each category in the trademark maintenance document, the registration form will still list multiple products or services in each category."

The USPTO pilot project found that "more than half of the owners of the selected registered trademarks cannot prove that the trademark is used for the specified goods or services".

The first solution adopted by the USPTO is to increase the readability of the registration announcement. The USPTO reformatted the announcement to ensure it was "more readable" for the signatory ".

By signing the registration notice, the signatory consents to the use of the mark in the field of commerce under Part I of the Lanham Act.

Denison also said the USPTO plans to "make the existing random review permanent".

The notice of proposed legislation to make random review permanent was made public in June, the public comment period was recently closed, and the USPTO is "drafting the final regulations".

Once the provision is formally implemented, "the lawyer representing the trademark registrant will inform the registrant that in order to maintain the registration, they may be required to submit materials to prove that the trademark is used in more than one class of goods or services."

Finally, the USPTO is "considering proposing one or more new or revised procedures to cancel the registration of trademarks that are no longer in use or have never been used".

According to Nanjing Huaxun, on April 28, the Trademark Public Advisory Committee met to discuss a new "removal procedure" and "several simplified" trademark trial and appeal board revocation procedures.