The new Ordinance for hearing disputes under the Marks and Geographical Indications Act (“The Ordinance”; “MGIA”) introduces in detail rules on the administrative procedure for examining particular disputes. That will result in predictability of the Patent Office’s activities when handling complaints and requests. Parties who are interested in initiation of proceedings will be able to get preliminary knowledge about the conditions and requirements with which the complaints and requests should comply. In this way the formal defects of applications will be limited and more proceedings will be ensured.
The Ordinance contains a detailed regulation of a variety of legal grounds and the particular factual circumstances which should be proved during the proceedings. Thus the parties are provided with the possibility to make preliminary assessment of the efficiency of proceeding brought up by their own initiative as well as for the provision of its successful progress.
Тhe Ordinance regulates the obligatory form and the content of the complaints and requests under Article 42 and Article 64 of the MGIA, the ways for submitting them, as well as the rules for correspondence between the parties to the proceedings. The facts and the circumstances which need to be proved in view of a variety of legal grounds for submissions of claims and requests are set forth. Grounds for suspending and for closing proceedings are also specified.
The rules for ex officio deletion of the registered national trade marks in cases in which they had been registered in breach of the provision of Article 11 of the MGIA is provided as well.
Appropriate safeguards are established for maintaining the confidentiality of materials submitted during the proceedings. The information covered by industrial commercial or other secret protected by law must be deleted.