REGISTRATION OF EXCLUSIVE TRADEMARKS IN VIETNAM

What is the trademark?

Trademarks are signs used to distinguish goods / services of one entity from those of another entity. In other words, trademarks are the sign for consumers to recognize the supplier’s products.

Why must you register an exclusive trademark?

This is a question posed by most individuals / businesses doing business today. Trademark registration exclusively is not a mandatory but necessary procedure. Trademarks are one of the objects of intellectual property. This is the property of the business, the factor that helps businesses connect with consumers in business activities. The consumer’s choice of product will be based on the product’s brand name. The more reputable the supplier, the more important the brand plays in selling products to consumers. Therefore, a brand that is meaningful, beautiful and eye-catching is not enough, the trademark must be protected exclusively so that the enterprise can feel secure to focus on developing products / services to build relationships long term and sustainable relationships with consumers.

Ownership rights to trademarks can be established through two mechanisms: registration with the National Office of Intellectual Property or automatic establishment when certain conditions are met. Currently, the automatic mechanism is only applied to well-known trademarks, i.e. the mark is widely known to consumers throughout the territory of Vietnam. Therefore, exclusive trademark registration is the way to establish ownership of a regular trademark and the easiest way to establish ownership of the trademark. In addition, the registration of exclusive trademarks also makes it easy for businesses to do the following:

First: Creating a monopoly position, in order to affirm the brand, affirm the reputation for consumers.

Second: Reducing the competitor’s ability to copy or imitate.

Third: There are enough bases to handle infringement of cases of counterfeiting, counterfeiting, affecting the reputation of the enterprise.

Fourth: Increase opportunities to commercialize products and easily conduct franchising.

Trademark registration procedures:

To register trademarks, enterprises need to provide us with the following information:

·        Sample of registered trademark (design file, photo, trademark sample printed directly on the products…).

·        List of business lines to be registered.

·        Business Information (Scanned copy / photocopy of business registration license).

Time and process of trademark registration:

·        Time of preliminary search, appraisal and assessment of the ability of the trademark to protect: 1 working day.

·        Time for document preparation and completion of registration procedures: 1- 3 working days.

·        After filing, a trademark application goes through the following stages:

+ Examination of the form of a mark registration application: 01 months from the filing date;

+ Publication of the trademark registration application: 2 months from the date the application is accepted as valid in form;

+ Content test: 10 – 12 months from the date of publication of the trademark registration application.

If the content test results show that the applicant’s trademark is capable of registration, the Vietnam Intellectual Property Office will issue a protection title within 2 months thereafter.

·        Term of protection: 10 years from the date of application. At the end of the 10-year period, the owner of the protection title may renew it many times, each extension will also have a term of 10 years.

If you are interested in consulting services on Trademark registration procedures and detailed fee reports, please contact the following information:

·        Hotline: 076 455 2008

·        Email: info.ipleader@gmail.com