China Trademark Registration Service
Hotline: 86-755-82143422 Email: anitayao@citilinkia.com
China trademark registration and protection is one of ATAHK's intellectual property services. To protect your trademark in China, one needs to acquire some basic information about China trademark protection.
Acquire Trademark Rights in China
1. What kinds of trademarks can be protected in China?
Under the Trademark Law of the People’s Republic of China (hereafter called Chinese Trademark Law), the only condition by which you enjoy exclusive rights to use your trademarks is based on the fact that your trademarks have been registered with the Chinese Trademark Office. For example, in some common law countries, the user of a trademark can acquire the exclusive right to use the trademark by using the trademark in commerce.
2. What kinds of signs can be Chinese registered trademarks?
According to Chinese Trademark Law, any visual sign, if it can be used to distinguish the goods or service of one natural person, legal entity or any other organization from that of others, including any word, design, letters of an alphabet, numerals, three-dimensional symbol, combinations of colors, and their actual combination, may be filed for registration.So far, Chinese Trademark Law does not allow sound marks, smell marks or other kinds of marks to be registered and the Chinese Trademark Office still doesn’t accept these types of trademarks’ registration applications.
3. Application First Principle
This principle is, where two or more applicants apply for the registration of identical or similar trademarks for the same or similar goods, the Trademark Office will grant the trademark right to whichever application is filed first. Where applications are filed on the same day, the trademark right shall be granted to the earliest user, and the other applications shall be rejected and their trademarks shall not be published.
Enforcing your trademark rights through administrative authorities
1. Administration Protection Mechanism
China has adopted a so-called “Dual protection, Parallel Operation” mechanism, which means that both the courts and the administrative authorities are entitled to enforce the trademark law. This mechanism has proved to be very effective over the past 20 years owing to how it “fits” to China’s ever evolving national conditions. The administrative protection mechanism, non-judicial procedure, is that the trademark owner can claim a trademark infringement before the government authorities and seek remedies when its trademark rights are infringed. The relevant administration authorities will investigate and handle the complaint by confiscating the infringing goods or by offering other remedies, such as ordering the offender to cease infringement, and impose fines.
2. Administration Protection Authorities
2.1 The Administration for Industry and Commerce (AIC)
AICs are established at every level of Chinese central and local governments. For the Chinese central government, the State Council set up the State Administration for Industry and Commerce (SAIC). Basically, the SAIC’s duty is to make rules, policies and to guide the work of local AICs. The SAIC doesn’t handle infringement cases. Local AICs handle trademark infringement cases that take place in their own areas.
2.2 Chinese Customs
Chinese Customs conduct an important function in intellectual property protection like most countries’ customs organizations around the world. The General Administration of Chinese Customs has set up in its head office as the Section of Customs Protection for Intellectual Property Rights especially responsible for recording intellectual property rights in Customs and lending guidance to Customs departments nationwide in taking protective measures.
Protection of Trademark Right with Civil Law
With the amendment of the Trademark Law in 2001, the administrations for industry and commerce no longer have the authority and power to charge trademark infringers to compensate economic losses to the owners of registered trademarks. At present, an increasing number of registered trademark owners prefer to protect their exclusive right to the use of trademarks with civil procedures. We will make a brief account of the related matters in the following paragraphs.
Protection of Trademark Right with Criminal Law
In comparison with the means of administrative enforcement of law and civil procedures, the appeal to criminal procedure for the protection of the exclusive right to the use of a registered trademark is the channel with greatest force and most obvious effect.
Article 213 of the Criminal Code of the People’s Republic of China stipulates that “Where any person, without authorization of the owner of a registered trademark, uses a trademark which is identical with the registered trademark in respect of the same goods shall, if the circumstances are serious, be sentenced to fixed-term imprisonment of not more than three years or criminal detention and shall also, or shall only, be fined
Contact Us
For further queries, please do not hesitate to contact ATAHK at anytime, anywhere by simply calling China hotline at 86-755-82143422, 86-755-82143512, or emailing to anitayao@citilinkia.com