Use it or lose it making sure your trade marks are not ripped from you

This is about the "use it or lose it" rule, as recently reinforced by the Federal Court to the dismay of a Hong Kong company. If a trademark has not been used at any time during the previous three year period, it can be removed from the Register.

Use of trade marks

Optical 88 runs a chain of optical stores in Hong Kong. It owns a number of registered trade marks in Australia which contain the name "Optical 88" in Chinese characters and in English. Here's one of them:

This is how Optical 88 had used its trade marks in Australia.

1. It sent bonus cash coupons and receipts containing its trade marks to customers in Australia a few times;
2. Its logo and the words Optical 88 were arranged in a different combination on a cleaning cloth.