China just passed a new amendment to its Trademark Law on August 30.2013, which will take effect from May 1. 2014. This is the third amendment of the law after previous amendments in 1993 and 2001 respectively since its adoption in 1982.

This amendment includes mainly six important changes:
1. Specifying the time limit for various processes of a trademark registration.
2. Simplification of trademark opposition procedures.
3. Clarifying the protection of the well-known trademark.
4. Strengthening the protection of exclusive rights to use a trademark.
5. Regulating the trademark application and use, forbidding the scramble for registering trademark to maintain the order of the fair market competition.
6. Strengthening of administration of trademark agencies.
The new Trademark Law simplifies the regulations and adds sounds as a registrable trademark element and the requirements are specified clearly. Particularly, there is no graphic representation in the trademark registration according to the new Trademark Law.

ZBSD   04-01-2014