China Improves Trade Mark Registration Quality

China has introduced policies to allow individuals to open agencies and provide trade mark services for applicants in a bid to improve registration efficiency in accordance with international norms.

The Trade Mark Bureau under the State Administration of Industry and Commerce (SAIC) newly approved 36 agencies to handle trade mark application and registration for domestic and foreign enterprises, bringing the total number of trade mark agencies in China to 136. The original 100 trade mark agencies are enterprises under the SAIC.

The administration also announced that all these agencies are allowed to handle trade mark businesses for foreign enterprises, a practice formally permitted to only a few of them. Ren Gang, an official with the administration, said that opening up the trade mark agency business to the whole of society is an inevitable trend for the development of the sector. "As the bridge to link applicants and government agencies, trade mark agents will play an increasingly important role in international economic exchanges," he said.

Official sources said that China's trade mark agencies handled 125,000 trade mark applications last year, accounting for 73 percent of the total. The registration efficiency of both domestic and foreign trade marks improved remarkably.

According to Ren, the administration will provide training for new agents while guiding and monitoring their business operations. Meanwhile, The Regulation on Trade Mark Agents, which took effect January 1 this year, provides the legal backup for trade mark agency services in China, said Ren.

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