The Canadian government has proposed
sweeping changes to the Trade-marks Act that will impact
current and new applications and registrations. The most important,
as noted in our earlier communications, deletes use as a
requirement for registration. However, there are a number of
important transition provisions that trademark owners should
consider.
Renewal
The renewal term will be reduced
from 15 years to 10 years, to comply with international trademark
treaties. The TMO now permits renewal to take place up to one year
before the expiry of the registration term. For any registration
now capable of being renewed, renewal should be done as soon as
possible to take advantage of the longer renewal term. It is likely
that registrants who renew now will be required to later classify
the goods and services in any registration using the Nice
Classification of goods and services. However, it is not expected
that there will be fees for such classification
post-renewal.
