Why Trademark Registration

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With quality expertise and knowledge in the IP industry, KashishIPR assists the clients in registering and enforcing their trademark via its strong network alliances. ✅   For more visit: https://www.kashishipr.com/

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Kashish Indian Sub - Continent IPR Management Limited is one of the leading specialized IP law firm providing all arrays of premium Intellectual Property services like a trademark, patent, copyright, design registration and other IP related issues to multi-facet business owners. We have a proven track record of more than a decade long experience of dispensing the highest quality of IP legal services. Our skilled and dexterous attorneys, coupled with an aptitude and a broad understanding of IP laws are capable of resolving the most complex IP related issues in a hassle-free and economically feasible way. We are a continually growing firm holding a prominent position and presence in the market. No matter how intricate and complicated the matter or location is, we are known for delivering on our commitments. Throughout the process, our team stays indirect access and contact with the clients. For building a long-term association with our clients, we strive to safeguard their business interests and legal IP related matters in the most effective manner. ✅   For view source: https://www.kashishipr.com/

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How Should You Do A Trademark Search in India?

Awareness in regards to Intellectual Property (IP) such as trademarks has gradually increased among Indian individuals, startups, and companies from the past many years. Nowadays, almost every businessman wants to protect a mark, sign, or symbol that can identify his products or services from other entrants. Statistics showed that the number of applications being filed for the registration of trademarks is continuously increasing. Hence, it is crucial for all who wish to enjoy the issue-free benefits of Trademark Registration in India to do a detailed search prior to applying for the same. It will make the applicant confident about the uniqueness of his mark, and increase the probabilities of successful registration. The main purpose of this article is to provide the readers with clarity on how to do the Trademark Search in India.

Trademark Search

A trademark refers to a sign, symbol, logo, or expression that identifies products and services from a particular source. A Registered Trademark gives its owner the exclusive right to use his mark and prevent it from being used by others without his consent.

A Trademark Search is what allows you to know the probabilities your mark possesses for being successfully registered. Knowing such probabilities in advance will help you save your precious time and hard-earned money by not proceeding with the Trademark Registration that has little or no chance of becoming successful. It determines whether the projected mark is existing for the use in relation to certain products or services. As per Indian law, in a trademark search, similar wordmarks and similar names in a specific class can be widely searched. Moreover, a trademark search can be done in the Indian Trademark Registry Database or third-party service provider website.

Steps to do Trademark Search

To do the trademark search in India, you need to visit the official site of the General of Patents, Designs, and Trademarks. The search can be done in any of the following two ways:

1.     Wordmark Search: For the representation of like wordmarks. Steps to do this are as follows:

Step 1: Once the official website opens up, select the search type as ‘Wordmark’ on the top of the webpage

Step 2: In the box present next to the ‘start with’ box, enter the wordmark you want to search

Step 3: Determine the class from 1 to 45 under which your products or services fall.

Step 4: After entering the suitable class, click the ‘search option.’ A report that shows all the similar trademarks and trademark applications will be generated.

Step 5: Choose the option of ‘show detail.’ It will display all the information like application number and date, owner’s details, and trademark status, validity, and description.

Step 6: Click the ‘tick box’ button, followed by clicking the ‘report’ option to save the details of the particular trademark application.

2.     Phonetical Search: For the representation of phonetically similar words. It includes the wider scope of trademark search that provides the user with an assurance that no similar mark exists in case of sound of the mark. Almost every step to do phonetic search is similar to wordmark search except step 1, where you will need to select the search type on the top of the webpage as ‘Phonetic.’

Bottom Line

People often have a query whether a positive trademark search report will serve them with the 100% possibility of success. Well, the answer is no; it doesn’t. Although even the Trademark Attorneys in India and outside find the trademark search beneficial in several ways, it may not provide precise predictions. It is because sometimes, trademark search reports could not identify all potential grounds for rejection or refusal. Hence, it is better to always proceed to Trademark Registration Process under the supervision of an experienced Intellectual Property Law Firm. For more visit: https://www.kashishipr.com/ 

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FNHI Subsidiary Worksport Secures U.S. Trademark

FNHI (Franchise Holdings International Inc.), the parent company of Worksport Ltd., has now reached a significant Intellectual Property (IP) milestone with the recent granting of the sole trademark rights to the Worksport name for light truck tonneau covers in the United States.

Worksport and FNHI CEO Steve Rossi said that the granting of this trademark to Worksport would protect their valuable IP like no other development. Worksport is their tonneau cover brand, and therefore, no one else except them can use the brand name. He continued by saying that it’s a great achievement, which paves the path for the company to grow without facing concerns related to its brand name. Furthermore, it is a critical aspect of growing their company’s value.

As per the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO), Trademark Protection is given to the first entity to use the specific mark in the geographic region where it operates, regardless of whether or not the mark is registered.

IP portfolio of Worksport and FNHI has been rapidly expanding for the last many years. And, the subsidiary now possesses four trademarks, with two each in the U.S. and Canada, in addition to one pending in China. Although pending, it reflects Worksport’s presence in the Chinese market. One, which has recently been granted in the U.S., is the company’s second but most critical trademark as both the Worksport logo and mark are now completely within their IP portfolio.

Steve Rossi said that Worksport has the word and logo mark, along with the name Worksport, a noticeable arsenal of IP. In the year 2019, they were awarded the first comprehensive trademark rights to ‘the Worksport name in Canada’ for the stylized Worksport logo. Apart from their trade name protection in Canada, they are truly a secured North American operator, with complete and absolute rights for their brand identity, and intend to enforce their rights in almost every locality.

Worksport, in November 2019, received an official USPTO notice that its recently filed ‘Alpha’ Patent Application has reached a pivotal milestone with the approval of all claims made in the application. Most of the claims were related to new technologies that would be utilized in a fresh line of advanced products to be offered by Worksport. Earlier in the same year, the company received the U.S. patent grant for its full-bed access light truck cover, the only thing in the industry that doesn’t extend into the truck bed. For more visit: https://www.kashishipr.com/ 

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USPTO Rules In Favor of Disney over Trademark Dispute

The United States Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO) has recently dismissed three Trademark Applications filed in association with the Tron blockchain project. The decision has been made after the American media giant – Disney submitted the notices of opposition and claimed that the acceptance of these applications would result in brand confusion.

What’s the Case?

Raybo Technology, a Chinese partner of the Tron Foundation, applied for the trademarks – TRON, TRON NETWORK, and TRONIX in February 2018. Disney tried pushing back the Chinese partner with formal filings in August, but Raybo Technology failed to respond, and thus, the USPTO ruled in favor of the American media giant.

Disney claimed that the trademarks would infringe upon the long history of the giant’s use and licensing of the film series with the same name. Actually, Disney had created an entire franchise around its 1982’s film TRON, including an animated TV series, a sequel film, music recordings, video games, and a line of merchandise.

Disney, in its notices of opposition, explained that the Tron Foundation has decided to present its brand name in all capital letters, and it is quite similar to Disney’s TRON trademark. The notices also said that this move uncovers bad faith on the part of the Tron Foundation and is likely to create confusion, which would possibly shake Disney’s long-standing customer base. Since the Foundation hasn’t responded to Disney’s notices of opposition in the following nine months, the patent office rejected its Trademark Registration Applications by default – as a consequence, according to November filings.

Jake Chervinsky, General Counsel for Compound, announced that Tron had neither taken the Trademark Registration Process seriously nor retained US counsel to represent them even when the USPTO has expressly required them to do so. Moreover, they failed to respond to the USPTO default notice. It means that they gave up their trademark attempt completely.

Justin Sun, CEO and Founder of the Tron Foundation, declared that TRON is a globally established brand and applications in connection with it were filed for products that didn’t violate Disney’s trademark. He then announced that the foundation would continue pursuing its trademark in the US.

Some reports showed that Raybo Technology now possesses nine trademarks in China, including “Tron,” “TRX,” and “Tronix,” for further approval.

At last, Chervinsky affirmed that there is nothing wrong with planning to file the trademark application even when faced with vigorous defenses like in the case of Disney, but the precise way to deal with such situations is to withdraw the request, not ignore the USPTO. For more visit: https://www.kashishipr.com/ 

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How to Transfer Trademark Rights in India?

With time and continuous advancements in almost every industry worldwide, trademarks has become one of the fastest emerging and most exclusive Intellectual Property Rights (IPRs) in India. A trademark, which identifies and differentiates the products or services of a business from those of others, is beneficial for not just brands but consumers as well. It generates the goodwill that bestows businesses with target customers and assists people in purchasing quality products. Another reason that makes any trademark popular amongst the Intellectual Property industry and several other sectors is its ability to get transferred. Indeed, the transfer of trademark rights is beneficial for both – who gives the rights and who takes them. Are you excited to have insight into the process of making profits through transferring trademark rights in India? Read below:

The Indian Trademarks Act, 1999 states that for transferring Registered Trademark rights, there is a need to opt for either trademark assignment agreement or trademark licensing agreement.

(I) Trademark Assignment

Trademark Assignment is a way to legally transfer the trademark rights of the assignor (original owner) to the assignee (person or company interested in obtaining the rights). In legal terms, it refers to the legal transfer of proprietary rights over products and services. The transfer under a trademark assignment is possible in the following ways:

(a) Complete Assignment: As the name depicts, this assignment facilitates the transfer of full ownership, i.e., all the rights, thus allowing the assignee to use, share, and process the mark in whatever way he wants while maintaining a distance from legal issues like Trademark Infringement. After the complete assignment of the trademark, the assignor hold no control over the brand, logo, or anything related to it.

(b) Partial Assignment: The partial assignment, which restricts the transfer of trademark rights to specific services or products, is beneficial for those who don’t want to lose complete control over their rights. It bestows the assignor with the option to share his rights while adding terms and conditions that limit the assignee’s control to some products. It means the assignee can use the trademark rights for only those things that are permitted by the assignor.

Procedure for Assignment of a Trademark

1. Create a trademark assignment application, including the request for the transfer of trademark rights. As per the Trademark Law, there is no hard and fast rule for who should make the application. Hence, anyone whether the assignor or the assignee can make the application, but it must be in FORM TM-P format and holds the terms of the transfer as well as details of both the parties.
2. File the prepared application before the registrar. As the delay in applying in front of the registrar can result in an additional fee, be cautious about filing within six months of proprietorship’s acquisition.
3. Obtain the Registrar’s Permission. Though the transfer of trademark works as per the needs of the assignor and assignee, yet it is mandated to follow the registrar’s direction before the expiry of the assignment. Although the period of assignment expiry in India is for six months, it is extendable under the registrar’s supervision.
4. Understand the registrar’s directions and according to them, advertise the assignment. After that, provide the registrar with copies of both advertisements and directions.
5. At last, the registrar after getting satisfied with the application, advertisements, and all documents will permit the transfer of the said trademark from the original owner to the new proprietor. By registering the name of the assignee in the legal record, the registrar ensures that now the assignee can use the assigned trademark rightfully.

(II) Trademark Licensing

It allows the transfer of a trademark while imposing some restrictions that prevent the licensee (new owner) from owing full ownership over the rights of the licensor (original owner). Although the concept of licensing appears a bit restrictive, it is beneficial for both licensor and licensee. It helps the former to expand his market and upsurge the number of consumers whereas the later to enjoy the royalties obtained with the trademark.

Assuredly, registering a licensing agreement is not necessary, still, the parties should do so to enjoy the expected benefits without facing issues. The procedure to Register a Trademarklicense agreement is similar to registering the assignment agreement. So if you want to go for trademark transfer via licensing, there is a need to make the application followed by filing it before the registrar. If you are a licensor and don’t want to create the application, you can ask the licensee to do so as the law states that anyone out of the two can create the application that must be in TM-28 form format. Once satisfied with the application, documents, and other formalities, the registrar will allow both of you to use the transferred trademark rights as per the terms mentioned in the license agreement.

The concept of transfer of trademarks is a tactic that generates benefits for both – who provides the rights and who obtains the rights. So if you also want to join the race and make profits with this approach, the above-given guide will help you for sure. However, before proceeding, it is recommended to have a deep insight into every fact related to this IPR, no matter whether it is related to the simple filing of the Trademark Application or any other aspect. For view source: https://www.kashishipr.com/blog/how-to-transfer-trademark-rights-in-india/

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Facebook Tries to Secure Trademark for the Term “Book”

After successfully getting the trademark for common, generic words ‘Face’ and ‘Book’ in the United States nearly 13 years ago, Facebook, one of the leading social media giants is presently attempting to accomplish the same in Europe.

Seeking to secure the word ‘Book’ under Trademark Protection, the social media giant applied for the same in the European Union Intellectual Property Office (EUIPO) in June 2019.

At present, the Trademark Application submitted to the EUIPO is under examination, with a decision expected later. The reason behind trademarking such generic words is to protect established brands from businesses that might deal in offering similar products and services under similar names, thus misleading the consumers and potentially taking the brands’ revenue.

The list Facebook provided in its application emphasizes a voluminous range of products and services, including things from electronic game software to wearable peripherals for computers, software for modifying photographs, and electronic radio components.

If the application gets approved, the term ‘book,’ which originally referred to an archaic paper-based data storage format, will soon join the words such as Face, Like, Wall, Poke, the letter F, and a particular shade of blue in the long list. Besides, Facebook will commence preventing its competitors from Trademark Infringements of the word ‘Book’ – something that will be a significant effort, but undoubtedly not outside the power of the social media giant and its legal teams. On the other side, the bad news for its competitors, especially small and fledgling companies is that Facebook has in the past appeared to be happy to go after and shut down the startups for perceived trademark infringement.

Nevertheless, this might not be the apt time to look for positive outcomes in Europe, where the amount of goodwill and trust towards American giants, in general, is at an all-time low. Still, Facebook is continuously trying hard to complete its trademark collection as it has already secured a trademark for the word ‘face’ more than a decade ago, thus making it plausible that its new application will be granted soon.

Meanwhile, in addition to ‘Facebook,’ i.e., ‘Face’ and ‘Book,’ there are many words such as ‘BOOMERANG,’ ‘LIKE,’ ‘F8,’ etc., that are protected as Facebook’s Intellectual Property (IP) in the US.

Nonetheless, Facebook is not alone in a frenzy to protect generic words as Registered Trademarks. For instance, fashion designer Mark Jacobs and Ohio State University are also striving to be the first in a race to register the word “THE” with the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO). For view source: https://www.kashishipr.com/blog/facebook-tries-to-secure-trademark-for-the-term-book/

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Copyleft – Everything You Need to Know About This IP License

We are living in a rapidly advancing era where the Internet has made it ever-harder to prevent unauthorized users from stealing one’s hard work. In such a malicious age, there might be hardly anyone who isn’t aware of the Intellectual Property Rights (IPRs). There are several IPRs that one can get to keep his original assets safe. However, the selection varies as per the needs of the owners and nature of the things to be protected. For instance, copyright is a set of some exclusive rights that empower the creator to prevent others from using his original creation without his permission. Indeed, almost all of us are aware of this IPR and understand that being creators, we need to safeguard our creative Intellectual Property (IP) with it. Nevertheless, it becomes a bit difficult in case of being prolific or having famous work, thus making many creators to move towards copyleft instead.

In this article, you will come across almost everything that you need to know about copyleft.

What is Copyleft?

Copyleft refers to an IP license based on the concept according to which you can distribute your work to others with the right to copy, modify, or share it further. It provides users with the freedom to use, reform, or distribute the work in whatever way they want on a condition of maintaining the same liberty in the revised editions of the work. It encourages better and more creations. Although copyleft compels people to distribute the modified work while transferring the same copyleft license to others, it doesn’t demand to make the copylefted work free as in case of the public domain.

What are the 3 Key Concepts of Copyleft?

1. Copyleft Is All About the Freedom of Users

In spite of the name that appears contradictory to copyright, copyleft is copyright’s subset intended with a goal to bestow users with freedom, not to abolish copyright. Copyright empowers the original creator of a unique and innovative work to legally control whether others can copy, modify, and distribute his work or not and if they can, then how. If a user uses a copyrighted work in a manner not similar to how its owner allows, he may face legal issues like copyright infringement. It means copyright law entitles the original creator to prohibit others from using his work in an unauthorized manner and also to take legal actions against such users. However, copyleft license exists inside the legal framework of copyright, but its core concept is to allow users to copy, change, or distribute works as per their need, with only one vital clause that the derivate works must offer the same freedom to other users.

2. Copyleft Isn’t Limited to Just Permission

Many people have a misconception that copyleft license is like a permissive license that bestows users with the freedom to do whatever they want. Well, the fact is that copyleft undoubtedly grants liberty but at the same time, imposes users to fulfill some demands. The most remarkable one is that the user accessing a copyleft object must distribute its derivative versions under license offering the same or similar rights to other users.

Example: Suppose you are a photographer who provides a copyleft photo to any company. The firm can copy, modify, and share the photo as it wants, but at a condition of allowing others to use the modified work with the same freedom.

Known as the ‘share-alike’ clause, this shows that copyleft isn’t limited to just giving freedom; it demands freedom as well.

3. Copyleft Isn’t Necessarily Free

As seen above, a copyleft works on two significant aspects; first: the freedom for users to reproduce, change and share derivative works, second: the “share-alike” condition to maintain liberty in secondary works for further users. However, freedom doesn’t mean that copyleft work is accessible for free. Indeed, you may be able to get any copyleft object without paying but only if the owner is ready. Moreover, most of the time, such works are available in exchange for some fees. Therefore, note that if you desire to use any copyleft work, you may have to pay for it.

What is the Difference Between Copyright and Copyleft?

Although the concept of copyleft has resulted from copyright, both these legal terms differ. One remarkable difference between copyleft and copyright is that the former permits third-parties to use the owner’s rights as they want, i.e., liberally but with a demand that they will not cut off the liberality and allow others also to enjoy the same freedom whereas copyright appears a bit restrictive and limit third-parties to use the rights as the owner wants. In short, copyleft provides and demands freedom, whereas copyright focuses on restriction and originality of the author’s work.

Copyright or Copyleft: What Should You Opt?

Well! The answer to this question depends on what you as a creator want; whether to keep the rights to yourself or welcome third-parties willing to do the same with other users. When it comes to financial benefits, copyleft licensing may not help you in making good money. Moreover, even if you could end up making earnings, there are possibilities that you would make significantly less than what you have made by traditional copyright rules. Hopefully, you have gained a better insight into copyright and copyleft and can make a fair decision yourself. However, in case you still have any doubt, it is better to consult an experienced attorney who can help you in having a clear idea of these two legal terms. For view source: https://www.kashishipr.com/blog/copyleft-everything-you-need-to-know-about-this-ip-license/

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