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PARAGUAY | Trademarks | Trademarks renewal in Paraguay is now only possible via Internet
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Starting 7 November 2016 -and with the issuance of Regulation N° 10/2016, the Paraguayan Trademark Office (DINAPI in Spanish) made a modification to the trademark renewal process, introducing the use of electronic forms as the only mechanism to make such requests.
DINAPI’s goal is that all intellectual property process can be done using electronic forms.
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ANDEAN COMMUNITY (BOLIVIA, COLOMBIA, ECUADOR and PERU) | Industrial Designs, Industrial Property | Andean Community: the novelty and distinctiveness of an industrial design may be affected by a figurative trademark
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By means of Prejudicial Interpretation 477-IP-2015, the Andean Court of Justice (ACJ) provided its binding legal opinion in a invalidity action filed by Pfizer before the Council of State of Colombia against the granting of an industrial design of a pharmaceutical tablet (very similar to the pill design used by Pfizer in VIAGRA, registered as a figurative trademark in Colombia) in favor of Lafrancol, considering that the industrial designs lacks novelty and distinctiveness.
The ACJ defined the guidelines that -mandatorily- the Council of State has to consider when comparing the industrial design with the figurative trademark, indicating that has to evaluate “if the granted design is confusing or not with the figurative trademark previously registered“, as an industrial design needs to comply with novelty and distinctiveness requirements. A graphical comparison -focused in an overall analysis between the design and the trademark, concerning the traces, lines, features and other external characteristics of both- must be done to determine if there are similarities in the industrial design as regards to the figurative trademark, allowing to conclude the lack or fulfillment of novelty requirement if there is a trademark with the same external shape in the market.
In the binding legal opinion was reiterated that an industrial design (i) cannot be know in any way at a global level prior to filing date or when priority is claimed -in order to not affect its novelty-, as well as (ii) it cannot entail the usual shape of products, as neither can be confusing with other distinctive signs previously registered -like figurative trademarks- in order to not affect its distinctiveness, which is mandatory even if this is not explicitly mentioned as a requirement in the Andean applicable law.
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WORLD | Patents | WIPO launches patent search service using chemical structures
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Since October 2016, WIPO’s PATENTSCOPE platform allows the search of patents using chemical structures. The tool recognizes the name of the chemical components used in patent texts (in title, abstract, claims and description fields), as well as identifies the chemical structures based on the drawings incorporated in the patents.
For now, the chemical structure search is only available for applications published in english and german (in the future it will be enabled in other languages), as well as for patents filed in USA since 1979.
Click here for more information.
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HONDURAS | Patents | PCT Applicant’s Guide now includes a summary of requirements for entry into national phase in Honduras
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The PCT Applicant0s Guide now includes information on the requirements of the Honduran Patent Office (Dirección General de Propiedad Intelectual in Spanish) as designated (or elected) Office in PCT applications. The requirements can be viewed in this link.
