Can acronyms get trademark protection?

Absolutely. Just go to  http://uspto.gov and do a trademark search for "BMW" using the TESS system and you'll see they've got numerous marks registered. The same could be done for many other acronyms: CNN, NBC, JVC, you name it -- provided they're being used as trademarks (i.e., as a designation of the unique source of products or services).

Trademark protection in Vietnam

First, abbreviations can be registered just like any other trademark, provided:

(i) they are not descriptive of the goods for which they are used;

(ii) they have some significance of their own;

For example, the mark BMW does not in any way describe that the underlying good is a car, as also, the significance of it is that, it stands for Bayerische Motoren Werke. However, even without registration, you can claim rights in an abbreviation, provided you can prove that the general population recognizes the abbreviation as atra source of the goods you provide. For example, people recognized FedEx for Federal Express, Coke for Coca-cola and so on.

Second, domain names are fully within the purview of trademark law, as well. This means that if a trademark owner can prove that a registered domain name is confusingly similar to the mark in which the owner claims rights, then he has a good case against the owner of that domain. However, going to the court is always an expensive ordeal, for which reason, the Uniform Dispute Resolution Policy (UDRP) was adopted, which gives owners of REGISTERED marks to file a complaint with Internet Corporation for Assigned Name and Numbers (ICANN) and have the infringing domain either cancelled or transferred back to the trademark owner. The latter process is very popular amongst corporations, it being more efficient and less expensive. However, the owner of the mark must prove the following in order to have either of the remedies:

 (i) that the domain name is confusingly similar to the registered mark;

 (ii) that the domain owner has no legitimate rights in the domain name;

 (iii) that the domain has been registered or used in bad faith.

 For example, if you registerwww.biemw.com, and have no other acceptable legitimate explanation as to why you registered the domain, then most likely BMW would be successful in an action against you.

Learn more about our ANT Lawyers Intellectual Property practice, its experience, and team members here. Please contact our Trademark attorneys in Vietnam  for advice via email ant@antlawyers.vn or call us at +84 912 817 823.

Let ANT Lawyers help your business in Vietnam.

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The Purposes of Using Criminal Record Card

Under Clause 1, Article 2 of the Law on Criminal Record 2009, criminal record card is the records on the previous convictions of a person that is sentenced under valid court judgments or decisions, and banning individual from holding position, establishing or managing enterprises and cooperatives in cases where the enterprises or cooperatives are declared bankrupt by the court.

The Purposes of Using Criminal Record Card

Article 7 – The Law on Criminal Record 2009 regulates that the following individual, agencies and organizations may request competent agencies to issue Criminal Record card:

-Vietnamese citizens and foreigners who have been or are residing in Vietnam have the right to request the issuance of their criminal record cards;

-Proceeding agencies may request the issuance of criminal record card for investigation, prosecution and trial;

-State agencies, political organizations and socio-political organizations may request the issuance of criminal record to serve the personnel management, business registration, establishment and management of enterprises and cooperatives.

Criminal record cards include:

a/ Criminal record card no.1 is issued to individual, agencies and organizations defined in Clauses 1 and 3, Article 7 of this Law;

b/ Criminal record card no.2 is issued to agencies conducting the proceedings, defined in Clause 2, Article 7 of this Law and issued at the request of the individual so that he/she can know the contents of his/her criminal resume.

The basic difference of these two types is that the criminal record card no.1 only records the sentence has not been removed. If the case has been deleted, it will state “no criminal record”. The criminal record card no.2 records all previous criminal convictions regardless of whether they were deleted or not.

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I will use my company's name in many applications and products. Is a trademark the best protection?

A trademark typically protects brand names and logos used on goods and services. A copyright protects an original artistic or literary work. A patent protects an invention. For example, if you invent a new kind of vacuum cleaner, you would apply for a patent to protect the invention itself. You would apply to register a trademark to protect the brand name of the vacuum cleaner. And you might register a copyright for the TV commercial that you use to market the product.

Trademark attorneys in Vietnam

The purpose of using a trademark is to uniquely identify your products or services to potential customers. Federal registration of a trademark helps prevent competitors of your business from stealing your business name, logo, or slogan. Registration also protects you against misappropriation by confusingly similar marks used by competitors. Protecting your unique name, logo, or slogan in the form of a trademark is one of the most important investments in your business.

How ANT Lawyers Could Help Your Business?

To learn more about ANT Lawyers IP Practice or contact our Intellectual Property Lawyers in Vietnam for advice via email ant@antlawyers.vn or call our office at (+84) 24 32 23 27 71

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Does copyright apply to contracts?

It depends on the type of contract. A contract written from scratch may be eligible for copyright protection. But, a contract made from a pre-existing template with only a few details changed here and there will not be eligible for protection.

Copyright Law Firm in Vietnam

Coming to your question, it depends on who is the actual author of the contract. If you wrote the contract and are not bound by any confidentiality clause, you can go ahead and use it for your own purposes (including distribution).

Even if someone else wrote it, the answer will remain more or less similar. A contract signed by you can be used for your own purposes but you cannot claim copyright in that contract.

If you use and distribute a contract written by someone else claiming it as your own, it will be a case of violation of copyright.

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Does "Property Law" include "Intellectual Property Law" or are the two areas separate?

They are separate, and largely different forms of law. Most of what is commonly referred to as "property law" deals with what is called real property; real estate, land, etc.   However, it does have some aspects of dealing with tangible personal property (which also overlaps with tort and criminal law)

Protecting Intellectual Property Rights

Intellectual property is a significantly different form of law drawing on other areas (notably unfair competition law, especially for trademarks; law of agency; business law; etc.) but is fundamentally its own "thing."

A notable example of the difference is the phrase "Possession is 9/10ths of the law." This may be true in property law, where a possessor has superior rights to most everybody but the true owner. However, it would fall flat in IP, where your status as the legal rightsholder is the most important question.

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How do I protect the intellectual property of my design?

First off, I’m very sorry to hear that someone has been falsely claiming your work as their own.

                                                       Industrial Design in Vietnam 

As you’ve probably gathered at this point, this entire scenario hinges on the contract (or lack thereof) between you and the event organisers.

Given how little information that we have to work with, i’ll answer generally from the perspective of Vietnam copyright law. Regardless of jurisdiction, you are right in thinking that this is flagrant breach of copyright.

This shouldn't be considered legal advice, but that I hope it helps you potentially avoid this situation in the future.

Is it possible to start legal proceedings against the thief?

The answer to this question depends entirely on information that you haven't included in your question. You said that you were the official designer for the event that the poster was designed for, so were you employed by the event organisers? or was the work commissioned? Is there a clause in the contract that states that you retain your ownership of the copyright despite it being work for hire? Each would point to a different set of options.

Basically it comes down to three potential situations:

If you are employed by the event organisers in all likelihood the work will be deemed to have been carried out in the course of your employment and thus under a contract of service and copyright will lay with your employer.

If are you are an independent contractor it is possible that the work was done under a contract for services in which case, it is possible that you retain the copyright ownership (unless the contract stipulates otherwise).

If you were commissioned to do the work you likely retain authorship unless the contract stipulates otherwise.

If you have retained authorship:

You are well within your rights to proceed with legal action against this person for breaching your copyright in the work.

If you don’t own the work:

You will need to try and get the event organisers (or whoever does hold copyright in the work) to bring an action against this guy.

OR you can attempt to sue him for breach of your Moral Rights-

As the creator of an artistic work, regardless of ownership, you have the right to be recognised as the creator (right of attribution).

To go down this road you’ll need to be able to prove that you are the creator of the work (easy enough with the meta-data from the files, the exchanges you will have had with the event organiser who asked for the work and the payments made for the work etc).

How can you protect your work in the future?

This might sound obvious now but include a watermark, send low resolution files for approval (BTW - how did this person get the file in the first place? Maybe you need to have a chat with the event organisers about ‘circulating’ files of this kind).

It might be worth considering including clauses in future contracts that retain ownership of the work thus putting yourself in the strongest possible position to challenge any infringers.

How should you confront the guy?

Since you know who this person is, start with a direct communication between the two of you, tell him that he is breaching your copyright and that he needs to stop. Dont go full on litigious unless you have no other options because it’s guaranteed to be drawn out and expensive.

However, if he doesn't care/respond then ramp it up: have a lawyer send a letter on big, scary law firm stationary demanding that he stop or you’ll start the appropriate proceedings.

And if that doesn't work and you’re in a position to do so, take him to court for breach of copyright.

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How easy is it to register a trademark?

Honestly, you could probably figure it out on your own. However, particularly when dealing with IP issue, there are certain fears/concerns about protecting all of your rights. Of the many reasons to hire a lawyer for a TM, here are few...

Register trademark inVietnam

1. The process can be complex and lengthy. You are most likely focused on developing your company and are probably working full-time in that capacity. Taking up this task on your own can really limit your ability to focus on your company.

2. The research and background work required for TM's is also exhaustive and can be tricky. Although you may be able to do this yourself, there is a chance you might make a mistake, overlook something, or simply take a path that is not the best for your company. A lawyer is a safe-guard against these problems.

3. Hiring a lawyer who is business savvy and well-versed in your particular industry cannot only help you with your TM, but can also develop a strong business plan moving forward. IP is a particularized field, and getting a lawyer on board who has helped similar clients in the past with IP issues can make a HUGE difference for your business.

If you want to find a lawyer, you should check out our site ANTLawyers.vn. You can connect with the trademark attorneys in Vietnam on our legal platform 24/7. We offer free consultations and price quotes so check us out!

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How do most companies protect their software through intellectual property law?

Source code could potentially be a trade secret for a software company, but in order to qualify for protection it would have to be actively guarded and not disclosed to anyone outside of the company. Trade secret protection is really for something like a secret recipe that has great value to the company solely because it is a secret known only by the company.

 Software Compliance Law Firm in Vietnam

A copyright is thebetter form of protection for software. As far as understanding what has been copyrighted — copyrights exist as soon as the work is fixed in a medium. So, any work (here, software) that you see has an implicit copyright on the original aspects of the work. The question of what parts of the work are original and thus protected by the copyright is a legal question that should be answered by an Intellectual Property Lawyers.

For that reason most companies will have copyrights on their software to some extent. Patents on software are more difficult to obtain than copyrights for a couple of reasons. First, the patent application process requires a strict review to ensure that the application meets the requirements — as opposed to a copyright which exists as soon as an author puts pen to paper. Second, patents are generally reserved for tangible inventions. It is possible that software can qualify for a patent, but it is much harder to show.

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What works are protected by copyright registration?

What is copyright?  

Copyright is the right of authors to control the use of their work for a limited period of time. In order to qualify for copyright protection, a work must be “fixed in a tangible medium of expression.” A work must be the result of some creative effort on the part of its author in order to qualify for copyright protection. For works first published after March 1, 1989, an author need not include a copyright notice to gain protection under the law. However, although a notice is not required, it’s helpful if you obtain one. When a work contains a valid copyright notice, an infringer cannot claim in court that s/he wasn’t aware the work was copyrighted. Thus, an author has a greater chance to win a copyright infringement case and spend much less litigating in the process if s/he has a copyright notice.

Copyright in Vietnam 

If a work is created on or after January 1, 1978 then it is protected for a term of the life of the author plus 70 years. However, if the work is a work for hire or is published under a pseudonym, the copyright lasts between 95 and 120 years, depending on the date the work is published.

Protected Works

A work becomes copyrighted when it is fixed in a tangible medium of expression. There are categories of work that fall under this definition:

Literary works

Musical works, including the accompanying words

Dramatic works, including the accompanying music

Pantomimes and choreographic works

Pictorial, graphic and sculptural works

Motion pictures and other audiovisual works

Sound recordings

Computer software

Architectural works

Not copyrightable:

Works not fixed in a tangible form of expression (ex. something said but not recorded)

Ideas, methods, principles and systems

Titles, names, and slogans

Works found in the public domain

Works that are strictly informational and contain no authorship

If you're looking for an affordable copyright attorney, check out ANTlawyers.vn. ANTlawyers.vn was established to meet these needs by providing fast, effective and economical solutions. Hope that clears things up a bit. Feel free to message me directly to chat further about any other IP questions that you face.

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Can I create a brand name that contains another brand name?

I’ll echo what others are saying—this is a bad plan. An established brand name is going to have trademark protections and will have no problem proving that they were already situated in the market long before you. Trademark law relies heavily on what the consumer thinks. If a consumer I confused by your brand name then it will only lead to problems. 

Register trademark in Vietnam

Your best option is to create a unique brand name. It may take a little more time and thought, but it’s possible.

If you have more questions about IP law, then you should consult an attorney. ANTLawyers.vn can put you in touch with a seasoned Intellectual Property lawyers in Vietnam that can help you with the process of trademarking your own brand name. Check out our website and get in touch if you’d like to set up a consultation.

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