Out-Law / Your Daily Need-To-Know
The cost of obtaining a Community Trade Mark (CTM) is set to fall after the European Commission and Member States agreed last week to reduce various filing, registration and renewal fees in relation to CTM applications and registrations.
reductions reflect a large financial surplus run up by the Office for Harmonisation in the Internal Market, known as OHIM, since the CTM filing system began in April 1996.
At present, the basic fee for a trade mark application is €975. This is set to fall to €900 for applications filed conventionally, but will cost only €750 for those applications filed electronically.
Trade mark registration fees are set to fall from €1,100 to €850, while the basic renewal fee will fall from €2,500 to €1,500. Again, renewals filed electronically face a further reduction to €1,350.
OHIM is trying to push electronic filing in order to simplify processes and decrease costs.
The fee changes will not come into effect until the draft fees Regulation has been formally approved by the Commission, but they are due to be in place before 1st November.
According to Lee Curtis, a trade mark attorney with Pinsent Masons, the firm behind OUT-LAW.COM, the fee reductions mean that the CTM system is even better value for money.
“A Community Trade Mark Registration covers all 25 Member States of the EU and if you trade in more than three Member States, the CTM system is by far the most cost effective way to protect your trade mark on an EU-wide basis,” he said.
