News & opinion

The sessions scheduled at INTA's 2023 Annual Meeting remind us that trademarks are not the only rights to consider when looking at brand protection.

26 April is World IP Day! This year's theme is 'Women and IP: Accelerating innovation and creativity', which provides an opportunity to talk about why it is important for women to be part of climate change innovation solutions, and to highlight a few of the women leading the way.

As a tech start-up specialist, Silicon Valley Bank (SVB) held pledges on numerous patent rights. Rose-Marie Ehanno explains how patent pledges work and what the collapse of SVB means for affected patent holders.

Artist Mason Rothschild has been ordered to pay Maison Hermès International US$133,000, after a New York jury rejected his defence of freedom of expression to find instead that his ‘MetaBirkin’ NFT infringed the fashion house’s trademark rights.

Air France KLM has successfully brought EU trademark opposition proceedings on the grounds of likelihood of confusion for the trademark ‘Flying Blue’ and the domain name flyingblue.com, as used for the airline's frequent flyer programme. Frouke Hekker outlines the EUIPO ruling and explains how likelihood of confusion is assessed.

A recent decision by the European Patent Office on neural network patentability has interesting implications for artificial intelligence and other computer-derived innovations, says Martin Kohrs.

A single letter can be registered as a trademark, provided that it is distinctive in relation to the goods and services to which it applies. But enforcing short signs, such as single letter trademarks, is another challenge.

The international systems for trademark and design protection continue to expand with Brazil the latest country to file an instrument of accession to the design protection system and Mauritius acceding the trademark system. The more countries that join the systems the better for companies that operate internationally.

In December 2022, the EU General Court discussed the assessment of the likelihood of confusion in the context of the dispute between the holders of the ‘Well and Well’ and ‘WellBe Pharmaceuticals’ trademarks. Florence Chapin sets out its conclusions

Unfair commercial practices not only prevent consumers from making informed decisions; they also impact the bottom line and reputation of the impacted companies. Here's what you can do about it.

Trademark disputes can have starkly different outcomes in different jurisdictions, as demonstrated by a number of parallel EU and UK oppositions. UK Trademark Attorney Mona Asgari examines the different positions taken by the EUIPO and UKIPO in a recent opposition based on indirect confusion and emphasises the importance of local representation.

In response to recent uncertainty around the need for a UK address for service (AFS) for UK trademarks and designs, the UKIPO issued a Tribunal Practice Notice on 25 January 2023. Vanessa Harrow sets out the changes and offers practical advice for affected rights holders.