Trademark registration South Korea

South Korea is one of many countries with first-to-file jurisdiction over trademarks. To obtain the exclusive rights over a trademark, you must register it in South Korea. Applications must be submitted to the South Korean Intellectual Property Office. Although active use of a trademark is not necessary to register it, it does contribute to its distinctiveness. Indirectly this means that rejection by the responsible authority is much smaller.

To register a trademark in South Korea, it can be any sign designed to distinguish goods or services from other goods and services that exist on the market. You can think of words, designs, logos, sounds, smells, 3D shapes, holograms, movements, colors and the combination thereof. For “exotic” or unusual trademarks, a detailed description is required. If your trademark concerns a sound mark, please send an MP3 or WAV file with your application form.

It is highly advisable to conduct a thorough trademark search prior to submitting your application. This gives you insight into the possible existence of previously registered, identical trademarks or trademarks that are very similar to the brand you intend to use. As a foreign entrepreneur, you also provide a power of attorney with your application. It does not have to be legalized. The intellectual property office then starts with a formal assessment, followed by a second, substantive assessment.

In South Korea, as in most other countries, third parties are given the opportunity to object to the registration of your trademark. They are informed of this by means of publication in the official trade gazette. Third parties have two months from the date of publication to lodge an objection. Opposition to the brand you want to register in South Korea can be based on the same grounds as the grounds for rejection used by the agency. Is there no objection? Then your trademark will be registered and you will receive a certificate.

If you submit a request to register your trademark in South Korea, it will go through various stages of review. Within these stages, there may be various grounds for rejection. These can be rejections on absolute grounds, but also on relative grounds. Absolute grounds for rejection include a lack of distinctiveness, the use of a well-known geographic name, a commonly used first name, and too generic a name for the goods or services you are offering. Relative grounds for rejection include an excessive resemblance to previously registered trademarks or a misleading nature.

When you want to apply for a combined trademark in South Korea, you apply for trademark protection for a trademark that consists of both verbal and figurative elements. It is important to realize that the protection only applies to the exact composition of these elements, as you presented it to the Intellectual Property Office. Do you also want to be able to use one of the separate elements and protect them separately? Then it is highly advisable to start a separate registration procedure for this.

If you decide not to switch to a separate registration, third parties can use this element without this having legal consequences for them. This can have far-reaching consequences for the image of your product or service and the turnover you make with it. When a third party offers products or services that are the same as yours, or very similar, you can object based on confusing similarity. In all other cases, your opposition’s chance of success is virtually nil.