Before learning about the Trademark Renewal procedure, let us first understand what a Trademark is. Any registered corporate entity working in the market for so long knows that to uniquely identify its products in the market, it must have a symbol or a mascot that pictorially defines or represents the Company. Such graphical representation is termed as the Trademark of the Company. One can register a Trademark for their Firm by registering the mark with the Intellectual Property Rights Authority, which in the case of India, is the Registrar of Trademarks. After the successful registration of a Trademark with the Authority, they are registere3d in the RoT, i.e., the Registrar of Trademarks. Each of these registered trademarks comes with validity. The registration of a Trademark in India is not absolute. Typically, the validity period of a registered trademark is five years. After five years, the Trademark becomes invalid, and Registrar removes it from the Register of Trademarks. Specific provisions in the Trademark Act of 1999 state that the applicant can do the Trademark Renewal before the validity period of 180 days in advance. Let us learn more about the Trademark Renewal procedure.
Any to-be-expired trademark owner can apply for the Trademark Renewal procedure in two ways:
The applicant can apply for the renewal procedure and change their Trademark's current appearance. This change can be done in any form. The applicant can change the colour, or the font size, of the colour of the text or font styles. He can also change the image in the trademark logo. Changing the pre-existing text in the Logo can be tricky because it changes the customer's familiarity with the Band if the name on the Trademark changes. Therefore, the applicant must be aware of such updations.
The applicant can apply for the Renewal procedure without any changes in the Logo's appearance.
To apply for the Renewal of a trademark, the applicant, along with the renewal form TM-12, must submit the required documents to the Registrar of Trademarks (RoT) as mentioned in the following points:
The Trademark Renewal process is as follows:
There are two ways to apply for Renewal. The renewal applicant can either visit the official premises of the department or apply for Trademark renewal online. Both options are available to the renewal applicant. The trademark registration renewal fees vary with the application mode.
The license renewal cost is ten thousand rupees if the applicant files the application in the office.
The license renewal cost is nine thousand rupees if the applicant files the application online. Since the online trademark renewal application fee is cheap, we recommend you file your renewal application online to take such registration processes online.
After ten years, if the Trademark Logo is not renewed. But the owner still has the option of trademark restoration. The trademark restoration is similar to the renewal process. But the only difference is the applicant must pay an additional fine for crossing the trademark expiry.