IPOPhil eyes automated trademark applications

THE INTELLECTUAL Property Office of the Philippines (IPOPhil) plans to automate trademark and industrial design applications by next year to cut down processing to a few days in a bid to shore up registration of intellectual assets, an official said on Monday.

The project is part of the agency’s 2012-2016 Philippine Action Plan on Intellectual Property Rights (IPR) Protection and Enforcement. The action plan aims to create nationwide awareness of the benefits of IPR in an effort to stamp out piracy, and encourage local businesses and universities to protect their innovations.

“The automation of trademark and industrial design applications will happen around the end of 2012. This will cut down the application and [preliminary] approval period to five days. Trademarks and designs shouldn’t take long to approve anyway because these are easy enough to review,” Andrew Michael S. Ong, IPOPhil deputy director-general, told BusinessWorld on the sidelines of the First Philippine Anti-Counterfeiting and Piracy Summit.

“Right now, we are averaging eight months for our approval process, because the applications need to be filed at the office directly. With the automation, these applications can be readily submitted online,” he continued.

Trademark and industrial design applications are first given preliminary approval by the IP office. The internal study determines whether the mark or model is eligible for an IP registration based on a standard criteria. Approved applications will then be published for opposition in various newspapers to ensure there are no other claimants and that public interests and welfare will not be harmed by the registration.

The automation, the official noted, pertains only to the preliminary approval process.

“The publication after the preliminary approval takes longer than five days, but this automation is a significant improvement on the current application process, so that people can find out immediately whether their trademarks or designs were rejected so they can immediately come up with a new one,” Mr. Ong explained.

“We are definitely expecting an increase in applications and registrations once the automation is rolled out, since this will make the process easier and cheaper for businesses,” he added.

Registered trademark and industrial designs last year increased by 7.58% and almost 23% (22.99%) to 12,028 and 642 filings, respectively, from a year earlier, IPOPhil data show.

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