Trademarks & Patents

Trademarks & Patents

TRADEMARKS

Consideration should be given to registering your trademark to protect it. Trademarks include such things as brand names, logos, company names, trading names and words and phrases.

Often referred to as intellectual property, they can be invaluable to a business and should be properly protected to prevent unauthorised use.

Trademarks are divided into various classes under “services” and “goods”.

Once your trademark is registered you can take legal action against any parties infringing it.

You can either apply for registration with the UK Trademarks registry or, if you do business overseas, under the Madrid System or, in the EU, under the Community Trade Mark (CTM).

PATENTS

To protect your investment in research and development of intellectual property, you should consider applying for a patent with the UK Patent Office, the European Patent Register or in other countries such as the USPTO in the USA. You can also apply under the PCT (Patent Cooperation Treaty) which is operated by the WIPO (World Intellectual Property Organization) which provides a centralised application process; the main advantage of this is that the option of obtaining patents in a wide list of countries is retained, without the need for a large number of applications. If a national application is successful, damages can be claimed from the date of the international applications publication. Unlike a trademark, a patent is usually how something works, how something is made or what something is made of.

These are complex areas and our experienced staff will be pleased to offer assistance and guidance and to act for you in registering your trademark(s) or patent(s).