Name and Trade Mark Registration
European Union trademark
European Trade Mark Registration
Procedure
The registration of a European Union trade mark is a standardised registration procedure carried out at the European Union Intellectual Property Office (EUIPO), located in Alicante.
A European Union trade mark is valid for ten years and may be renewed indefinitely for further periods of the same duration.
Under this procedure, a validly registered trade mark is deemed to be registered in the following countries:
Germany, Austria, Belgium, Bulgaria, Cyprus, Denmark, Slovakia, Slovenia, Spain, Estonia, Finland, France, Greece, Hungary, Ireland, Italy, Latvia, Lithuania, Luxembourg, Malta, the Netherlands, Poland, Portugal, the United Kingdom, the Czech Republic, Romania, Sweden…
The application may be filed in any of the official languages of the European Union; however, the application must specify a second language from among the five official languages of the EUIPO (Spanish, English, German, French or Italian) which may be used as the language of proceedings in the event of opposition or proceedings for revocation or invalidity.
European Trade Name Registration
Application and procedure
It is possible to claim both priority rights and seniority rights for trademarks that have already been registered.
We would like to emphasise that, whilst if a European Union trade mark is refused in any one country it is automatically refused in all of them, this does not mean that the trade mark is left without protection in the EU, as the procedure can be continued by applying for the relevant national trade marks in those countries where there are no issues, with priority based on the European Union trade mark application.
We would also like to inform you that the existence of an earlier national trade mark does not prevent you from registering it as an EU trade mark, and both may co-exist provided they belong to the same owner.
* If you would like to find out about the most significant changes in the new European Union Trade Mark Regulation (EUTMR), which came into force on 23 March 2016, please contact us.
The application may be filed in any of the official languages of the European Union; however, the application must specify a second language from among the five official languages of the EUIPO (Spanish, English, German, French or Italian) which may be used as the language of proceedings in the event of opposition or proceedings for revocation or invalidity.
The processing times are as follows: Once the trade mark application has been filed, it is published in the Official Industrial Property Gazette (BOPI); from the date of publication, a three-month opposition period begins; once this period has elapsed, if the application has not encountered any obstacles, it will be granted by the Office.
Monitoring and Oversight of the Case File
Full service
With regard to monitoring, we offer a comprehensive service throughout the entire legal life of the file until its expiry, thanks to the checks carried out in the Official Gazettes of Spain, the European Union and worldwide.
With this service, we will be able to detect at an early stage whether a third party has filed a trade mark application that is the same or identical to yours, so that we can lodge a notice of opposition in a timely and proper manner, thereby preventing your rights from being infringed.
With this service, we also ensure that we notify you well in advance of the renewal of your files before their expiry date.