As a core component of intellectual property rights, trademarks are not only carriers of commercial reputation and symbols of integrity, but also vital tools for enterprises to compete in the market. How does the newly revised Trademark Law address emerging challenges plaguing industrial development and better safeguard the legitimate rights and interests of market operators and consumers? Reporters with Xinhua Insight interviewed relevant experts and scholars for answers.

“The newly revised Trademark Law organically integrates public oversight with administrative supervision. It cuts consumers’ costs of rights protection, improves trademark examination standards at the source, and prevents unqualified trademarks from entering the market,” commented Ma Yide, Dean of the School of Intellectual Property, University of Chinese Academy of Sciences.

“Trademarks are functional commercial assets, not collectibles. Their value stems from goodwill accumulated through market application, not merely registration certificates,” Ma Yide stated. Moving forward, the regulatory framework will further embed the principle of “balancing registration and use”, strengthen reviews of actual trademark utilization, shrink profit margins for trademark hoarding, and channel trademark resources toward genuine business operations.

Unregulated competition has plagued the trademark agency sector in recent years. Many agencies participate in or assist clients with malicious squatting, hoarding and resale of trademarks, with constantly evolving illegal tactics forming underground industrial chains.

“Regulating the trademark agency market is challenging due to uneven practitioner qualifications and incomplete industry self-governance rules. Effective legal remedies for this sector’s irregularities were a key focus of the revision,” Guan Yuying explained.

To address these issues, the updated Trademark Law enhances filing supervision over trademark agencies and their practitioners, and adds provisions defining the roles and functions of trademark agency industry organizations.

The revised statute clarifies that trademark agency industry organizations are self-regulatory bodies of the sector. They shall strengthen industry self-discipline, formulate self-governance codes and disciplinary rules, deliver professional training together with ethics and practice discipline education, guide members to conduct trademark agency services in compliance with laws, continuously upgrade industry service standards, and impose sanctions on members violating self-regulatory norms.

“As a valuable complement to government supervision, industry self-regulation leverages the professional expertise and self-management capacity of trade bodies, fostering a mutually reinforcing dynamic between administrative oversight and industry self-governance,” Du Ying said.

Luckin Coffee trademarks were squatted in Thailand, while time-honored brands Shaoxing Huadiao Wine and Daughter Red faced malicious overseas registration in Japan. As more Chinese enterprises expand globally, certain trademark agencies facilitate or carry out malicious overseas squatting, hindering Chinese brands’ international layout.

The revised Trademark Law stipulates that where proof of a trademark’s renown among relevant domestic audiences is required during overseas trademark examination, review or dispute settlement procedures, the national trademark administration department may, upon parties’ requests, confirm the trademark’s well-known status in accordance with relevant provisions.

Furthermore, the revision standardizes cross-border trademark agency practices and tightens supervision over fraudulent and improper conduct in handling overseas trademark matters, stopping the spillover of malicious squatting and irregular agency activities to foreign jurisdictions.

“The trademark system protects commercial goodwill built through authentic business operations, not mere preemptive registration. This safeguards brand value accumulated by enterprises over decades and prevents unfair free-riding by third parties,” Ma Yide remarked.

Experts advise enterprises to uphold the “trademark-first” strategy when venturing overseas. Prior to entering foreign markets, companies should complete international trademark layout and registration applications as early as possible, combining legal safeguards with commercial strategies to mitigate the risk of overseas trademark squatting.(Liu Zhen, Reporter of Xinhua Insight, Xinhua News Agency)

                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                Source: Xinhuanet