According to the Law
on Intellectual Property in Vietnam, the subject matter of industrial
property rights shall comprise inventions, industrial designs,
designs of semi-conducting closed circuits, trade secrets, marks, trade names
and geographical indications.
Rights to an
invention, industrial design, layout design, mark shall be established on the
basis of a decision of Intellectual Property Office of Vietnam to grant a
protection title in Vietnam or the recognition of international registration
pursuant to an international treaty of which Vietnam is a member. The remaining
being: (i) rights to trade name shall be established on the basis of lawful use
thereof; (ii) rights to a trade secret shall be established on the basis of
lawful acquirement of the trade secret and maintaining confidentiality thereof.
How are term and scope
of protection of the right to an arising object on the basis of granting of a
protection title?
Firstly, protection
titles shall be valid throughout the entire territory of Vietnam. This
provision means the validity of title is only territorial. It means titiles
granted by any country will only take effect within its territory and are not
accepted in other countries or other titles granted by Intellectual Property
Office of Vietnam will take effect throughout the entire territory of Vietnam.
Secondly, regarding
each industrial property object, validity of protection titles
are different. Such as validity of the invention patent is 20 years from the
grant date but the timeline to calculate until the end of 20 protection years
is filing date. Regarding utility solution patent, the validity shall be 10
years and the calculation until the end of 10 years is same as calculation of
invention patent. It should be noted that validity of invention patent and
utility solution patent may not be extended. However, industrial design patent,
certificate of registered mark may be extended. In particular: (i) industrial
design patent shall be shall be valid from the grant date until the end of five
years after the filing date and may be extended consecutively with each time of
5 years. Therefore, industrial design patent may be extended up to 15 years;
(ii) certificate of registered mark shall be valid from the grant date until
the end of ten years after the filing date. However, this object has a special
feature that it is able to extend repeatedly and consecutively the validity
with each time of 10 years. Therefore, this object may be extended validity
forever.
Regarding certificate
of registered geographical indication, it shall have indefinite validity
starting from the grant date because of its characteristic of sign used to
identify a product as originating from a specific region, locality, territory
or country. Reputation of products bearing a geographical indication shall be
determined by graphical conditions, including natural factors (climatic,
hydrological, geological, topographical and ecological factors and other
natural conditions); Human factors (skills and expertise of producers, and
traditional production processes of localities…).
In addition, one of
objects having specific validity is certificate of registered design of
semi-conducting closed circuits. Certificate shall be valid from the grant date
until the earliest date among the following: (i) the end of ten years after the
filing date; (ii) the end of ten years after the date the layout design was
first commercially exploited anywhere in the world by a persons with the
registration right or his or her licensee; (iii) the end of fifteen years after
the date of creation of the layout design.
Having said that, when
the owner of industrial property object is granted protection title, it should
be noted at time of expiration of title to apply for the extension in
order to guarantee interests as well as benefits that industrial property
objects brings. The owner could contact IP department of ANT Lawyers and
patent, trademark and other IP attorney in Vietnam will be assisting the client to review the matters and
provide relevant advice.
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