EUIPO will consolidate its online filing tools on 1 July to create a single, clear filing experience.

As part of the update, the Easy Filing forms will be integrated into the standard online filing process.

In an announcement, EUIPO stated: “The change aims to simplify navigation and reduce duplication between tools, making it easier for users to identify the appropriate filing option and complete their applications. The filing process itself remains unchanged. Applicants will continue to submit trade mark and design applications through the EUIPO website using the standard online forms. Fast Track examination remains possible if applications comply with the required conditions.”

EUIPO will continue to offer tools such as Early TM Screening, allowing trade mark applicants to carry out an initial pre-assessment before submitting an application.

In preparation for the update, information and guidance on the EUIPO website will be updated. Further support is available through EUIPO Online, the help pages and user assistance services.

The Early Bird deadline for booking for the MARQUES Annual Conference is Friday 26 June.

This year’s Annual Conference takes place Lisbon, Portugal from 22 to 25 September. MARQUES members who wish to attend are strongly recommended to register early as places are filling up fast.

At the time of writing, 670 people form 67 countries have already registered.

You can find out more about the Conference and book your place on the MARQUES website here. The Early Bird full residential rate is €3,400 for MARQUES members and €4,250 for non-members.

Conference theme and programme

The theme of the Annual Conference is “The Exciting Evolution of Trade Marks” and the panel sessions will focus on how trade marks are evolving in exciting ways as businesses explore new ways of using brands and other IP assets to build trust with consumers.

The Annual Conference will feature plenary sessions on topics including:

• The fine line between fame and genericism
• Innovative strategies to unlock the value of IP
• The role of regulation beyond trade marks
• The intersection of geographical indications, trade marks and international trade
• Beyond greenwashing: the new Digital Product Passport

It will also include updates from EUIPO and the annual review of CJEU and EU General Court case law.

Interactive workshops at this year's Annual Conference presented by the MARQUES Teams will cover:

• Amicus curiae submissions
• Anticounterfeiting at trade fairs
• Protecting voice, image and identity
• AI and marketing
• Improving the UDRP
• EU design developments

Social programme and hotels

The social programme includes an informal Welcome Reception on 22 September, Cultural Evening at SUD Lisboa on 23 September and Gala Dinner Evening on 24 September.

The main plenary sessions will be held at the Epic Sana while the workshops will take place at the nearby Dom Pedro. Accommodation is available at both these hotels, as well as the InterContinental.

You can choose your hotel when booking (subject to availability). Special hotel rates have also been negotiated for delegates wishing to extend their stay either before or after the Annual Conference.

Modular participation is also available for anyone who wishes to source their own accommodation or who lives locally.

WIPO has announced that representatives can now submit “Appoint/replace representative” requests directly from the “Find and monitor” tab in eMadrid.

This enhancement, made in response to user demand, is designed to make it easier to take over management of international trademark registrations.

Benefits include: no need to request access rights to the international trademark registrations first; manage multiple international registrations in a single request; and holders are automatically prompted to authorise requests digitally.

Note that there must be a holder email address on record for the registrations. Requests can be submitted for multiple registrations if they all have the same on-record email address.

Read more about this new feature, including instructions on how it works, on WIPO’s website here.

On 1 April 2025, the Trademarks Office at the Canadian Intellectual Property Office (TMO) published practice notices governing case management, confidentiality orders and cost awards (the triple-Cs) that govern all proceedings that it oversees, including oppositions and cancellation proceedings.

L Vivienne Stern and Sanjukta Tole explain the practice notices.

Case management

The TMO has introduced rules allowing case management governing both opposition and non-use cancellation proceedings that aim to create productive and cost-effective procedural solutions, particularly for exceptional cases.

Therefore, the TMO now has the power to give any direction or make any order to manage its proceedings, particularly to hear related files together or consecutively, convening a conference call with the parties to address scheduling and conduct of upcoming hearings, and managing uncooperative behaviour that may hinder a proceeding.

A request for case management can be made and the TMO will advise if it is necessary based on, inter alia, whether substantial delay has occurred or will occur, how complex the proceedings are, the number of related files and whether the parties are represented.

Three situations are identified by the TMO as circumstances that could warrant case management: divisional applications in oppositions, corrections to protocol applications, and proceedings in which an order has been made by the TMO that the evidence be kept confidential.

In contrast, the TMO is unlikely to use its case management powers in opposition proceedings to grant amendments or strike all or parts of parties’ pleadings, or to grant extensions of time where such a request has been refused.

Confidentiality orders

All documents filed in trade mark proceedings before the TMO are de facto available to the public pursuant to the open court principle. In recent years, the TMO has made such documents available online.

Now, in exceptional circumstances, the TMO may order that information contained in affidavit evidence filed by any party to a proceeding remain confidential upon request of the party providing the information.

Prior to submitting the evidence in a proceeding, a party may request that a portion or all of the evidence that they intend to submit be kept confidential. However, the TMO will not grant requests to keep any pleading or part thereof confidential as such orders may only apply to evidence filed in proceedings before the TMO pursuant to statute.

The Supreme Court of Canada has specified that a person requesting a confidentiality order must demonstrate that:

1. The open court principle poses a serious risk to an important public interest;
2. The order sought is necessary to prevent this serious risk to the identified interest because reasonable alternative measures will not prevent this risk; and
3. As a matter of proportionality, the benefits of the order outweigh its negative effects.

The TMO has adopted this test to evaluate requests for confidentiality orders in proceedings it oversees. If an order is issued, the TMO will set out the manner of serving and submitting confidential information by the party making the request.

A confidentiality order may be revoked or amended by the TMO, including the designation of additional information as confidential. Where it is necessary to refer to information that has been designated “confidential” in a ruling or decision, the TMO will issue a public version which has been redacted and a confidential version that contains the full decision.

Cost awards

In exceptional circumstances and upon request, the TMO may award costs against a party to a proceeding, regardless of whether the party is successful.

Cost awards are meant to encourage parties to conduct themselves efficiently. Therefore, any request for costs must detail the reasons for the request and the circumstances for which costs are sought. The TMO may award costs in the following non-exhaustive circumstances:

1. Against an applicant where a trade mark application is refused by the TMO on the grounds that it was submitted in bad faith for certain goods or services;
2. Where a party files a divisional application after the original application has been advertised, and the costs relate to that specific divisional application;
3. Where a party withdraws its attendance at a hearing less than 14 days before the scheduled date of that hearing; or
4. Where a party’s unreasonable conduct causes undue delays or expenses in the proceeding.

The non-requesting party is given the opportunity to respond to a claim for costs by the TMO.

The TMO will provide reasons for its decision on any cost awards and directions thereto. A schedule for costs awards also came into force on 1 April 2025, highlighting the principle that parties must have knowledge of the law before acting.

Costs will not be awarded where the grounds to claim costs occurred prior to 1 April 2025. This will have only a short-term effect as most proceedings commenced prior to 1 April 2025 will conclude soon if they have not done so already.

L Vivienne Stern is an Associate and Sanjukta Tole is a Partner with Dickinson Wright LLP in Canada. Sanjukta is a member of the MARQUES International Trade Mark Law and Practice Team

EUIPO has updated its guidelines for staff on the responsible use of generative AI (GenAI) tools.

It says the new framework “sets out how GenAI can be used safely and transparently across the Office, while maintaining human oversight, data protection and legal compliance”.

The guidance is set out in Communication No 1/2026, which replaces guidelines from 2023 and aligns the Office’s approach with the EU Artificial Intelligence Act and relevant European Commission guidance on the responsible use of AI.

EUIPO says the updated guidelines introduce clear rules on prompting and information handling, particularly with regard to the protection of personal data, the verification of AI-generated outputs and the need for human oversight at all stages, and highlight that staff remain fully responsible for any content generated with AI tools and reminds colleagues that AI outputs must always be critically reviewed.

EUIPO introduced mandatory AI Driving Licence training in 2025 and this applies to all new colleagues joining the Office.

More details are available on this page on the EUIPO website, which includes a graphic on EUIPO’s responsible approach to AI (pictured above), information on AI governance, a summary of current usage of AI tools in the trade mark lifecycle and usage in other areas.

The EUIPO Grand Board of Appeal has upheld a decision that the book titles ANIMAL FARM and 1984 should be refused for being descriptive of certain goods and services.

On 6 March 2018, the Estate of the late Sonia Bronwell Orwell filed an application to register the word mark ANIMAL FARM for goods and services in classes including 9, 16, 28 and 41. On the same date, the Estate filed an application to register 1984 for goods and services in classes including 9, 16 and 24.

The relevant goods and services cover audio video, magnetic and digital carriers, books, printed matter, toys and games, education and entertainment-related services.

In June and July 2019, the applications were partially refused under Article 7(1)(b) and (c) of the EU Trade Mark Regulation because they described certain characteristics of the goods and services for which protection was sought, and were also devoid of any distinctive character.

The Estate appealed both decisions. In decisions of June and July 2020, the Fifth Board of Appeal referred the cases to the Grand Board, citing diverging decisions on the registrability of titles of books or names of well-known characters.

Shortly after that, ANIMAL FARM was registered for goods and services in classes 18, 21, 25 and 45 and 1984 was registered for goods and services in classes 18, 21, 25, 28 and 45.

Grand Board reasoning

In its decision, published on 27 May, the Grand Board concluded that the signs applied for were descriptive for all the goods and services applied for in classes 9, 16, 28 and 41, because a significant part of the relevant public would immediately recognise ANIMAL FARM and 1984 as the titles of George Orwell’s novels. They would therefore perceive those signs, at first sight and without further cognitive steps, as designating the subject matter of the relevant goods and services.

The Grand Board found that the relevant public primarily rely on titles and authors to identify and select artistic works but rely on publishers or other trade indicators to identify the commercial origin of the relevant goods and services, stating:

When used in relation to goods and services whose nature is to contain or provide expressive content, a work title will be perceived first and foremost as identifying the work itself, rather than as indicating that the goods or services originate from one undertaking. In the absence of evidence that the relevant public has been educated through use to perceive the work titles as badges of origin, the signs cannot fulfil the essential origin function of a trade mark.

It further explained that the difficulty in registering titles of famous works as trade marks arises from the fundamentally different functions performed by titles of artistic works and trade marks, stating:

Whereas a trade mark serves to identify the commercial origin of goods or services, the title of a work serves primarily to designate and distinguish the work itself. In the absence of any established market practice whereby the title of a single work is used as an indicator of the undertaking responsible for the goods or services, the relevant public is not accustomed to perceiving such titles as badges of origin.

The Grand Board concluded that the relevant public would understand the signs ANIMAL FARM and 1984 as descriptive and non-distinctive indications in relation to the content or subject matter of the goods and therefore devoid of distinctive character.

Titles of artistic works

The Grand Board said that for titles of literary works to be registered as trade marks they must have distinctive character, adding:

The decisive question is whether a sign consisting of the title of a literary work, when used in relation to goods and services such as books, printed matter, digital data carriers, education and entertainment services, would be perceived by the relevant public not merely as designating the work itself, but primarily as an indication of the commercial origin of those goods or services. In other words, it must be determined whether such a sign is capable of fulfilling the essential function of a trade mark, namely to distinguish the goods or services of one undertaking from those of other undertakings.

In this case, it said, the Estate had not put forward any evidence showing that the relevant public perceived a connection between the marks applied for and a specific commercial undertaking. Nor was there any indication that the existence of copyright had determined or materially influenced the perception of the signs by the relevant public.

Finally, the Grand Board encouraged the EU legislator to consider whether an EU-wide right for titles of works should be created, to address the legitimate interests in protecting them.

The full decision (reference R1719/2019-G) can be found on EUIPO’s website here. The Estate can appeal the decision to the EU General Court.

WIPO has published the latest edition of the Madrid System Yearly Review, which includes facts and figures from 2025.

According to the publication, there were 64,000 international trademark applications filed in 2025, with over 450,000 designations. Over 943,000 international trademark registrations were in force in 2025, with over 7.5 million designations.

Applicants in the United States filed the highest number of international trademark applications (10,997) – a 2.5% decrease on 2024 – followed by Germany (6,106) (-5.3%), China (5,636) (-4.9%), France (4,026) (-4.4%) and the United Kingdom (UK) (3,871) (+3.7%).

L'Oréal of France remained the top applicant for a fifth consecutive year, filing 274 applications. The USA’s Light and Wonder, Inc climbed 38 spots to become the second top filer (105 applications), followed by Slovenia’s Krka, Tovarna Zdravil, DD, Novo Mesto (101).

About 80% of all international trademark applications filed in 2025 included one to three goods or services classes. The most popular class was class 9, followed by class 35, class 42 and class 41.

There were 2.5% more subsequent designation requests in 2025 than in 2024, a third year of growth. Requests have grown by 57% over the past 15 years –  from over 43,000 in 2011 to over 68,000 in 2025, reflecting the accession of new members and a broader push by holders into established markets.

You can download and read the report on the WIPO website here.