The Legal 500

According to the current Article 24 of the Taiwan Patent Act, animal varieties and plant varieties are not patentable subject-matters.

As soon as Turkey started to take an active role in international trade, intellectual property rights have recently increased in importance. Due to the effects of European Union harmonization process, Turkey has made and is still continuing to make several amendments on its national legislation for the purpose of protecting the intellectual property rights more extensively.

There is not yet a specific protection in Turkey for privacy of personal data through data protection laws. Data protection in Turkish law is governed by the Constitution and a variety of general and sectorial laws such as the Civil Code, Criminal Code, Labor Law, Banking Law and the Bank Cards and Credit Cards Law though there is a Draft Law on Data Privacy, which was prepared and developed by the Turkish Ministry of Justice for several years without success.

Decree with Force of Law No. 556 (“Trademark Decree”), prepared and issued by the Council of Ministers in accordance with Directive 89/104 EEC of European Council and European Community Regulation (EC) No 40/94 on Trademarks, introduced the formal protection of trademarks in Turkey.

Riza Ferhan Cagirgan of Gur Law Firm discusses the development of IP litigation in a developing country

An Ankara IP court has recently ruled that cancellation decisions should be based on the evidentiary documents submitted to the Patent Institute during the opposition or appeal stage, and not simply on the arguments put forward by the parties. Trademark owners are thus advised to submit all relevant documents to the institute during the opposition or appeal stage.

In Turkey, the rights of the holder of genuine rights in a trademark obtained through prior extensive use in the market are protected pursuant to Article 8/3 of Decree-Law 556. Recent decisions by the Court of Appeal indicate that this extensive use also extends to use in member countries of the Paris Convention and the World Trade Organization Agreement on Trade-Related Aspects of Intellectual Property Rights