APEC Survey on Non-Traditional Trade Marks

APEC Survey on Non-Traditional Trade Marks

As part of efforts to contribute to capacity building and information sharing amongst APEC economies, Singapore initiated a survey on the Law and Best Practices to Examine Non-traditional Trade Marks (NTTM).? The APEC economies participated in this survey under the auspices of the APEC Intellectual Property Experts’ Group (IPEG).

As lead economy for this matter, Singapore (represented by IPOS) finalized the survey questions in consultation with various APEC economies and collated the responses of the 16 economies which submitted returns to the survey.? A Report covering issues such as the definition of trade marks in various economies, types of non-traditional trade marks registrable in each economy, broad requirements to be fulfilled by applicants who wish to register non-traditional trade marks in each economy and case law clarifying issues surrounding such marks has been prepared by IPOS and filed with the APEC Secretariat.

The report is publicly available on the APEC website via the following links :

http://www.apec.org/apec/apec_groups/committee_on_trade/intellectual_property.html ?

(See “Downloads”)

http://www.apec.org/content/apec/publications/all_publications/committee_on_trade.html

It is hoped that this Report will serve as a useful resource to all who require more information about the registration of NTTM in the APEC region.