As a mark that distinguishes an enterprise's brand from other enterprise brands, trademarks are mostly embodied in the form of words, graphics, letters, numbers, three-dimensional signs, color combinations, and sounds. They have the role of identifying the source of goods and carry the goodwill and reputation of enterprises. Today, with the rapid development of commodity economy and the complete popularization of the Internet, the phenomenon of trademark squatting and infringement is increasing day by day, and the protection of trademarks by enterprises is even more urgent.

By June 2019, there had been 38.651,000 trademark applications, 25.823 million registrations, and 227.743 million valid trademarks, with an average of 5.2 market entities having one valid trademark. The average number of effective trademarks per 10,000 market entities in China has increased from 1,074 in 2011 to 1,923 at present, and the trademark awareness of market entities has been continuously enhanced. (Statistical data source: Analysis of Trademark Registration in the first half of 2019, issued by the Trademark Office of the State Intellectual Property Office on October 21, 2019)

We learn from several cases about the protection and tread on the pit of different enterprises in trademark protection.

Case 1:

In December 2004, Alibaba Group's third-party online payment platform Alipay was launched, and Alibaba Group applied for the "Alipay" trademark in the corresponding category on November 29, 2004.

Case 2:

On November 26, 2019, the hit drama "Qingyu" was launched on Tencent Video and iQiyi, earning enough attention from the audience. The play was adapted from the novel of the same name "Qingyu", which was first published in Qidian Chinese Website (one of the brands of Shanghai Xuanting Entertainment Information Technology Co., LTD.) in 2007. The "Qingyu" trademark was first applied for registration in the core category in December 2007.

Case 3:

Tea Yan Yue Color is a brand of Hunan Changsha Tea Yue Catering Management Co., LTD., founded in March 2015, the main tea and dessert, is based on Hong Kong, Guangdong and Taiwan beverage creative milk tea shop. With the increase of its popularity and market influence, the official did not pay attention to the protection of the trademark, and the trademark "tea Yan Yue color" was registered by many enterprises in China. The following figure is part of the intercepted registration data.

At the beginning of 2019, students studying in South Korea applied for "Tea Yan Yue Color" as a Korean trademark, and said it was paving the way for Tea Yan Yue color to explore overseas markets. The official helpless response "the other party's behavior is legal, we have no right to interfere", and therefore realize that their work in trademark protection has been lacking, resulting in an extremely passive situation.

Case 4:

Muji, a Japanese grocery brand founded in 1980, means good products without a brand logo in Japanese.  Towels "and other goods on the application for registration. Thereafter, it continued to apply for the "Muji" trademark in April 2002.

On April 06, 2000, Hainan Nanhua Industrial Trading Company applied for the registration of the trademark "Muji" on the above commodities in Class 24, and transferred the trademark to Beijing Cotton Field Textile Co., LTD in 2004, and Beijing Cotton Field Textile Co., Ltd. used the trademark in its daily business activities.

As a result, the two domestic and foreign Muji opened a no-fire trademark war, involving trademark opposition, review, first instance, second instance, retrial administrative cases, trademark infringement civil cases and many other cases. The Final Good Product Project company's "Muji" trademark has not been obtained on the 24 categories of "cotton goods; Approved registration on goods such as towels. At the same time, for allegedly violating the exclusive right to use the "Muji" trademark of Beijing Cotton Field Textile Co., Ltd. was sentenced to pay 500,000 yuan and reasonable expenses of 126,000 yuan.

The number of similar cases is too numerous to list. Through the above cases, it is not difficult to see that the trademark of the enterprise needs to carry out a strategic layout as far as possible before the goods or services are not in the market, and it is also necessary to do a good job of confidentiality, once the goods or services with the enterprise commercial identity enter the market, it will face the risk of being registered by others, for the enterprise, the market influence of the early hard work may be done for others. Companies have to buy high prices from squatters or start lengthy trademark administrative procedures to fight for it, and every step late will be difficult.