BKIP Limited

COPYRIGHT BKIP 2020
Preparation for trademark application paperwork in Taiwan Jun 2020
According to the provisions of the Taiwan trademark application, the necessary documents for the trademark application are as follows:
1. Trademark to be applied for: for application on paper, five trademark printouts shall be provided. For online application, the trademark design shall be in the form of a jpg file with an image quality higher than 300dpi.
2. Applicant Information: For company applicant, the company name, unified code, name and address of the representative shall be provided. For individual applicant, name, ID number and address of the individual shall be provided.
3. Goods and service items: Each good or service item to be registered shall be designated to a class in accordance with the official specifications of the Intellectual Property Office. Classes 1 to 34 are for 20 items without extra fees. Additional official fees will be charged for every extra item. Class 35 to 45 do not limited to maximum number of items to be registered. Subclass 3519 in Class 35 only allows 5 items, and additional official fees will be charged for every extra item.
4. Priority right documents: If the applicant has already applied the same mark in other countries, he must produce the priority right document and a Chinese translation thereof within six months from the date of application.
5. Other supporting documents: These documents are not essential, for example, a trademark coexistence consent form etc.
With the above documents you can initiate the trademark application process. However, the likelihood of approval of a trademark application is highly related to whether there are prior registrations. Meanwhile, whether the good and service item of the trademark is the same as the prior registration is one of the examination criteria. Therefore, apart from paying more attention to prior registrations, you can also hire a professional trademark agent to conduct a trademark search for you to eliminate possible risks. Meanwhile, the trademark agent can screen the goods and services you intend to choose. For non-standardized items, the agent can also provide more accurate suggestions to avoid the issue of amendment notice by the authority and the need of amendment or addition of classes, which delay the trademark registration process.
As for priority right documents, although each country adopts the Nice Classification for the classification of goods and services, there are still quite a number of goods and services that are non-standardized goods in Taiwan. A professional agent can provide you a more accurate analysis, gaining more comprehensive protection for your goods and services and expediting the trademark application process by increasing the efficiency of the examination process of the committee.
The most common other supporting documents are co-existing consents. For example, after you have negotiated with the registered trademark owner, you shall draft a co-existing consent so that the committee will not conduct the similarity assessment during the examination of your trademark. However, it is a difficult question as to how to draft a proper co-existing consent. Trademark agents can solve this problem for you.
In conclusion, it is not extremely difficult to apply for a trademark in Taiwan, but the details are still the key. As the saying goes, the devil is in the detail, the application process looks simple but in fact there are many things to pay attention to. As an entrepreneur, you may find these tedious details troublesome but you can solve these problems simply by engaging a professional trademark agent.