A Study On The Legal Regulation Of Trademark Registration In China

With the development of market economy the main market players are better aware ofthe important value of trade marks. Driven by interests, behaviors of “free-ride” andmalicious trademarksquatting of the players tremendously threatened the order of themarket. In recent years the issue of trademark squatting has become a problem andchallenge that has to be faced and settled in our judicial practice. Many policy judicialdocuments has also emphasized on harsh control on improper trademark squatting. Tobetter settle the practical issues, the “Decision on the Revision of the ‘Trademark Lawof PRC’” was adopted on August30th,2013and the “Regulations on issues ofadministrative cases of authorization and confirmation on the right of trademarks”was as well published online on October14th,2014, which have made great progresson regulation of trademark squatting. On this occasion it’s necessary to review thelegal regulation on the issue of trademark squatting in our country and make furthersuggestions accordingly on the basis of acknowledgement of the existing progress.This essay includes four parts.The first part was about the basic problems of trademark squatting, which firstlyintroduced the different connotations on trademark squatting and summarized theextension of this concept. And then it analyzed the problem of legal nature oftrademark squatting which is very controversial and made a distinction betweenillegal trademark squatting and malicious trademark squatting. At last it summarizedtypes of illegal trademark squatting.The second part is an analysis on the cause of trademark squatting from theperspective of institutional part and social part. The institutional reasons include thesystem defect of the acquisition of trademark right, insufficiency of legal regulationsand protectiveness and the territoriality of the trademark. While, the social reasonsinclude the profitability of the trademark under current marketing circumstances, aswell as a lack of protective awareness of the trademark of the trade users and theenterprises.The third part reviewed the legal regulations on trademark squatting on the basis ofthe newly amended laws and regulations and arranged the problem into five levels. Itanalyzed the Trademark Law currently in force (amended in2013) and relevantregulations of the draft of judicial interpretations. Besides, this part also discussed therelationship between the Anti-unfair Competition Law and trademark squatting, andanalyzedthe current situation of the “Anti Law” in our country. The fourth and last part made suggestions on regulation on illegal trademark squattingfrom the perspective of making full use of recent regulations and futureimprovements.And prospects are made on the relevant judicial interpretations.