On The Competition Law Protection For Trade Name

The significance of trade name, a mark of an enterprise, has been widely noticed in the modern competitive society. In the environment of market-oriented economy, improving trade name law protection, esp. the competition law protection system is of great importance to safeguard the legal rights and interests of an enterprise, guarantee the safety of market dealing and maintain competitive order.Nowadays, the disputes about trade name have been on the rise, which reflects the sluggishness of our country's relevant legislation as well as the increase of market subject. The preliminary legal provisions in our country have been formed, but many severe weaknesses exist: decentralization, inaccurate fixed position, mutual contradiction, covers not all sides and sluggishness. Trade name hasn't been completely protected; a lot of illegal competition exists, esp. the academic circles haven't made systematic research; trade name protection has been barely (treated) > made from the point of view of competition law and trade name legal system hasn't been systematized or institutional. So our country's legal provisions are difficult to meet the needs of business operation and market competition.As a result, on the basis of our country's present condition of trade name protection and theoretical research, the paper tries to define trade name and trade name rights, reveal the competitive meaning of trade name to an enterprise and the importance of competition law protecting trade name rights, and on the above basis and consulting overseas system, put forward the personal view about competition law protecting trade name rights.This paper is divided into four parts.The first part states trade name and trade name rights. Firstly, the definition of tradename is given, which is the prereguisite the paper develops. There are two major viewpoints about the concept of it. One is that trade name equals the name of an enterprise. The other is that the former is not the equivalent of the latter. The former is the nucleus and the only one among components of the latter that reflects an enterprise's individual character. The paper agrees with the latter view. On such basis, the paper makes clear the characteristic of trade name as a sign of business and the connections between trade name and an enterprise, and discusses the significance of trade name helping an enterprise compete in modern market economy. Trade name is also among the objects of illegal competitive act standardized by competition law. Secondly, the paper discusses the nature, acquisition and content of trade name rights and analyzes illegal competition acts directed at trade name reflected by the contradiction of trade name rights and trademark rights to determine the standardized angle of competition law and relevant laws related to trade name.The second part expounds the legislative protection of trade name. Competition law forbids illegal competitive acts serving trade name as object. In fact, it is also a kind of protection for trade name. Compared with other countries' and international legislation patterns of trade name protection, our country's present-existing legislation shows severe shortage of trade name protection, esp. the shortage of competition law.The third part is the about legislative protection of trade name. This part mainly discusses how competition law standardizes the corresponding illegal competition act and achieves the goal of protecting trade name, namely the function of competition law mainly consists of preventing trade name from being confused and opposing the desalination of trade name. In order to realize the dual function, competition law, mainly against illegal competition, can protect trade name from the following aspects: conduct all-in protection through common legal provisions; expand the scope of standardization, even if trade name hasn't been registered, it can't be confused, and the protection can be expanded to the fields without competitive relations with the owner of trade name rights, serving whether or not to confuse and desalinate trade name as a standard. The fourth part sets forth the idea about competition law protection system of tradename. First, compare other countries' legislation and international conventions to find out how they standardize illegal competition acts directed at trade name. On such basis and in the light of specific conditions of our country, the paper raises come suggestion on legislation as follows: registration is not necessarily the precondition to protecting trade name; after transferring trade name, the assignor is not allowed to continue his former business. The act of the use of others' trade name aiming at causing confusion by the subject with competitive relations belongs to illegal competition acts; the popularity of the trade name should become prerequisite to the illegal competition act by using others' trade name of the subject without competitive relations.