If you have started a business, or have developed a new product, surely you will have invested a lot of time and money in its start-up, preparing a business plan, choosing a name, advertising, web, social networks, commercial premises…

However, you have not thought about registering your trademark. And this is a big mistake.

 

Why?

Firstly, because if your trademark succeeds, it is likely that any competitor wants to use it and benefit from your effort and investment and, to do so, register the trademark. If this happens, it is quite likely that you will be forced to change the trademark of your products and/or services. With all the inconveniences that this entails. Customers will stop associating your products or services with the new trademarks and you may lose customers. In addition, having to change the trademark on all the items that carry it will incur many additional costs.

On the contrary, if you have your trademark registered, the law gives you the exclusive right to use it, so you can prevent the above from happening. In addition, you can also prevent third parties from using your trademark fraudulently for counterfeit products, with the damages and losses that this topic implies.

You can also grant licenses to third parties, thus obtaining economic benefits for the payment of royalties and, in addition, you will preserve the quality of the products or services.

Also, trademark can be sold if you are not interested in maintaining it for whatever reason.

 

Basic information about trademarks

As a trademark, you can register: words, images, figures, symbols and graphics, letters, figures and combinations thereof, three-dimensional shapes, sounds, any combination of all the indicated.

Products and services that can be protected: There are 45 classes of products and services. A trademark can be applied for one or more of these classes, depending on the products or services for which it is going to be used. The choice of these classes and the products and/or services is very important since it may depend on the trademark being registered.

Territory: a trademark can be registered at national, community or international level. Before filing, it is necessary to search to see if there are identical or nearly identical trademarks in official records, to minimize the risk of the trademark being denied.

Duration: a trademark, depending on the territory in which it is registered, usually has a validity of 10 years, and may be renewed for successive periods of another 10 years, unlimitedly.

 

Therefore, if you want to protect your business, we advise you to register your trademark.

 

For more information, contact us, trust professionals: info@lexlem.com

 

Maria Carcelen

22th June 2020

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