Copyright means rights of an organization or individual to works which such organization or individual created or owns.
Copyright shall arise at the moment a work is created and fixed in a certain material form, irrespective of its content, quality, form, mode and language and irrespective of whether or not such work has been published or registered
Almost of trade marks have to register to be protected, it is not natural protection. However, Well known trade mark need not register to protect, it shall be natural protection if it is suitable for all of its conditons.
A trade mark is registered protection and registered Trademark Certification shall be valid within 10 years. And then, if the own’s trade mark want to be protected continue, they can pay for renewal fees. A trade mark can be extended more times However, a trade mark can be abolished if it has not been used for 5 years
There are 4 types of trade marks: collective trade mark, Certification trade mark, Integrated trade marks, Well known trade mark.
Collective trade mark means a mark used to distinguish goods or services of members of an organization which is the owner of such mark from marks of non-members of such organization.
Certification trade mark means a mark which is authorized by its owner to be used by another organization or individual on the latter’s goods or services in order to certify the origin, raw materials, materials, mode of manufacture of goods or manner of provision of services, and the quality, accuracy, safety or other characteristic of goods or services bearing such mark.
Integrated trade marks means identical or similar marks registered by the same entity and intended for use on products or services which are of the same, similar or interrelated type.
Well known trade mark means a mark widely known by consumers throughout the territory of Vietnam. A trade mark is called a well known trade mark when it has the following criterias: The number of relevant consumers, The territorial area, Turnover, Duration of continuous use, Wide reputation, Number of countries protecting, Number of countries recognizing, Assignment price, licensing price, or investment capital contribution
Every organizations, individual doing business, or any entity has right to apply for registering trade mark for their own goods and service.
Organizations or individuals shall have the right to register marks to be used for goods they produce or services they provide
Organizations and or individuals carrying out trading have the right to apply for registering trademarks of the goods they trade in, provided that the producer does not use such trademarks for respective products and oppose their use.
Collective organizations lawfully established shall have the right to register collective marks to be used by their members under the regulations on use of collective marks. For signs indicating geographical origins of goods or services, organizations having the right to register them shall be collective organizations of organizations or individuals engaged in production or trading in relevant localities.
Organizations with the function of controlling and certifying quality, properties, origin or other relevant criteria of goods or services shall have the right to register certification marks, provided that they are not engaged in production or trading of such goods or services.
Two or more organizations or individuals shall have the right to jointly register a mark in order to become its co-owners on the following conditions:
– Such mark is used in the names of all co-owners or used for goods or services which are producedor dealt in with the participation of all co-owners;
– The use of such mark causes no confusion to consumers as to the origin of goods or services.
For a mark protected in a country being a contracting party to a treaty which prohibits the representative or agent of a mark owner to register such mark and to which the Socialist Republic of Vietnam is also a contracting party, then such representative or agent shall not be permitted to register such mark unless it is so agreed by the mark owner, except where a justifiable reason is available.
Right to apply, even the filed applications, can be tranfered to other individuals or organizations in the form of written contracts, bequeathal or inheritance according to law, provided that the assigned organizations or individuals satisfy the respective conditions on the persons having the registration right.
According to Intellectual property law, there are some signs shall be ineligible for protection as marks:
– Signs identical with or confusingly similar to national flags or national emblems.
– Signs identical with or confusingly similar to emblems, flags, armorial bearings, abbreviated names or full names of Vietnamese State bodies, political organizations, socio-political organizations, socio-politico-professional organizations, social organizations or socio-professional organizations or with international organizations, unless permitted by such bodies or organizations.
– Signs identical with or confusingly similar to real names, aliases, pseudonyms or images of leaders, national heroes or famous personalities of Vietnam or foreign countries.
– Signs identical with or confusingly similar to certification seals, check seals or warranty seals of international organizations which require that their signs must not be used, unless such seals are registered as certification marks by such organizations.
– Signs which cause misunderstanding or confusion or which deceive consumers as to the origin, properties, use, quality, value or other characteristics of goods or services.
A mark shall be deemed to be indistinctive if it is a sign falling into one of the following categories:
– Simple shapes and geometric figures, numerals, letters or scripts of uncommon languages, except where such sign has been widely used and recognized as a mark;
– Conventional signs or symbols, pictures or common names in any language of goods or services that have been widely and regularly used and known to many people;
– Signs indicating time, place and method of production; category, quantity, quality, properties, ingredients, use, value or other characteristics descriptive of goods or services, except where such sign has acquired distinctiveness by use before the filing of the application for registration of the mark;
– Signs describing the legal status and business sector of business entities;
– Signs indicating the geographical origin of goods or services, except where such sign has been widely used and recognized as a mark or registered as a collective mark or certification mark as stipulated in this Law;
– Signs other than integrated marks which are identical with or confusingly similar to registered marks of identical or similar goods or services on the basis of applications for registration with earlier filing dates or priority dates, as applicable, including applications for registration of marks filed pursuant to a treaty of which the Socialist Republic of Vietnam is a member;
– Signs identical with or confusingly similar to another person’s mark which has been widely used and recognized for similar or identical goods or services before the filing date or the priority date, as applicable;
– Signs identical with or confusingly similar to another person’s mark which has been registered for identical or similar goods or services, the registration certificate of which has been invalidated for no more than five years, except where the ground for such invalidation was non-use of the mark pursuant to sub-clause (d) of article 95.1 of this Law;
– Signs identical with or confusingly similar to another person’s mark recognized as a well known mark which has been registered for goods or services which are identical with or similar to those bearing such well known mark, or for dissimilar goods or services if the use of such mark may affect the distinctiveness of the well known mark or the mark registration was aimed at taking advantage of the reputation of the well known mark;
– Signs identical with or similar to another person’s trade name currently in use if the use of such sign may cause confusion to consumers as to the origin of goods or services;
– Signs identical with or similar to a protected geographical indication if the use of such sign may mislead consumers as to the geographical origin of goods;
– Signs identical with, containing or being translated or transcribed from protected geographical indications for wines or spirits if such sign has been registered for use with respect to wines and spirits not originating from the geographical areas bearing such geographical indications;
– Signs identical with or insignificantly different from another person’s industrial design which has been protected on the basis of an application for registration of an industrial design with a filing date or priority date earlier than that of the application for registration of the mark.
A mark shall be eligible for protection when it satisfies the following conditions:
It is a visible sign in the form of letters, words, drawings or images including holograms, or a combination thereof, represented in one or more colours. But the most important, the mark is capable of distinguishing goods or services of the mark owner from those of other subjects, not be identical or confusingly with the other registered mark.
The trademark owner can be an organization or individual or any legal entity. A trademark is an intellectual property, it usually includes a word, a name, phrase, logo, sign, design, image or a combination of these factor. Therefore, a trademark may be located on a package, a label, a voucher or on the product itself.
Trademark is protected if two conditions are met:
-Signs is used a trademark as a visible sign that can be in the form of letters, words, pictures, photographs, including three-dimensional image or a combination of the above factors, is expressed by a or more colors.
– Signs that are capable of distinguishing the goods or services of the trademark owner’s goods or services of other subjects
If foreign company would like to file new trademark application in Vietnam, S&B Law would like to advise you procedure and our fee schedule in relation to the trademark registration proceeding in Vietnam as follows:
1. Fee schedule
In Vietnam, multi-class application is applicable. The basic fees are calculated based on the number of class of goods/services (G/S) in each application as well as the number of products designated in each class in the application.
Below is the breakdown of charges for registering a trademark in Vietnam, in a smooth case, for your consideration:
|
Official Fees (USD) |
Attorney’s fee (USD) |
|
| 1. Fee for conducting atrademark search in one class |
– |
60.00 |
| 2. Fee for filing an application for one class of G/S with up to 6 products in each class |
40.00
|
80.00
|
| – Fee for each additional class of G/S in the application |
33.00
|
50.00
|
| – Fee for each additional products in exceed of 6 in each class |
7.00 |
2.00 |
| 3. Fee for granting a registration certificate for one trademark in one class of G/S; |
21.00
|
30.00
|
| – for each additional class of G/S in the application |
7.00 |
2.00 |
|
TOTAL: |
332.00 |
|
|
In words: Three hundred and thirty two US dollars |
||
Note: The above-quoted fees do not include 5% VAT of our service charge, bank charge and actual communication cost. In case of any office action or any possible opposition which may occur during the application prosecution, an additional charge would be incurred, upon the your approval. Further, the trademark search is optional and upon your request. The search will be conducted unofficially with the NOIP, the result of which is available within 5-7 working days.
2. Procedure and timeline
The duration for a trademark application from mature to proceed to registration is around 14-18 months from the filing date, involving these stages (1) examination as to formality and publication on the Gazette ( 3 months); (2) examination as to substance (9 months) and (3) issuance of registration certificate for the registered mark (2 months). Kindly note that the term for registration process normally takes longer to several months in practice due to the workload of the NOIP and the slow examination process by the NOIP’s examiner.
3. Requiread document and information
– Name and address of the Applicant;
– List of Goods/Services;
– Specimen of the applied mark;
– An original Power of Attorney which is simply signed by the Applicant (our form in attachment) (Please be informed that a scanned/faxed copy of the Power of Attorney is acceptable upon filing provided that the original copy is submitted within 01 month from the filing date.
