Executive Summary? A ‘Unitary Patent’ is expected to be available from 2014 on, by means of which a patent with unitary effect in all of the 24 participating EU states will be granted with only one request and without further validating the European patent in any one of the desired participating states. Only one unitary… more

The European Commission has pursued its proposal to amend the CTM Regulations and the CTM Directive. These regulations will become legally valid in spring 2014. The changes are not very revolutionary, but a few changes might also be of interest to trademark owners. In detail: A mark will in future be called European Trademark instead… more

The legal situation Revocation of a German trademark can be requested, if the mark has not been genuinely used during 5 consecutive years. If the trademark has been used only for some of the goods and services covered by its specification, it will be revoked only partially, namely for those products it has not been… more

Initial situation In June 2008, the ICANN (Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers) – which is responsible for the allocation of Top-Level-Domains (TLDs) – decided to introduce new (generic) TLDs. Within the given time frame, it received 1.930 applications, amongst others TLDs named after trademarks or company names (e.g. “.nike”), regional TLDs (e.g. “.bayern”)… more

The legal situation In order to remain valid and enforceable, registered trademarks must be genuinely used on the market by their owner or with his consent. Genuine use can also be found if the trademark is used in a form differing in elements which do not alter the distinctive character of the mark in the… more