How to Dealing with Trademark Infringement in Vietnam?

According to Vietnam law on intellectual property, when detecting the trademark infringement act, the trademark owner has the self-protection right includes (i) apply technological measures to prevent acts of trademark infringement (ii) request organization or individual who commits an act of trademark infringement of the holder to terminate such act, make a public apology or rectification, and compensate damages; (iii) request the competent authority to handle with acts of trademark infringement in accordance with the provisions of laws.

 

Trademark Infringement in Vietnam

Firstly, to apply the technological measures to prevent acts of trademark infringement measure, infringed party may give our the information related to original of emergence, trademark certificate, protection and duration scope and other information related to the right of trademark owner in order to inform that the infringed trademark are under protection warn the infringing party not to infringe. Besides, the owner of infringed trademark may use the technical means or measures to mark, identify, distinguish and protect the infringed trademark.

 

Secondly, the owner could also request organization or individual who commits an act of trademark infringement of the holder to terminate such act, make a public apology or rectification, and compensate damages. In particular, the trademark owners may themselves or authorize to individual or organization, IP attorney in Vietnam to send to the infringed party to stop the the infringement by indicating the information regarding origin of infringement, trademark certificate, protection scope, protection duration and set a reasonable period of time for the infringer to terminate the act of infringement. In addition, depending on the case and level of infringement, the written request will bear different content. It can be said that this is a prior-should-use measure before taking other measures including application of technological measures. If the violating party cooperates and stops the infringement, it will save time and money of both parties when not taking other stronger measures.

Thirdly, owner of trademark could request the competent authority to deal with acts of trademark infringement in accordance with the provisions of laws. When the trademark owner sends the request as mentioned above to infringing party, and, the violated party does not cooperate and continue the infringement, infringed party may sent a request to competent authority with the information such as: date of making the request; name and address of infringed party or their legal representative; name of receiving request authority; name and address of infringing party; name and address of the suspected violator in the case of request for temporary cessation of customs clearance for exports or imports suspected of infringement; brief information of infringed trademark and infringement; proposed measures to handle infringement; documents and evidence accompanying the request. Depending on the seriousness of the infringement, the petitioner may submit a request to the relevant authorities to apply administrative, civil, criminal or customs measures. Be noted that if the request is sent to custom authority for temporary cessation of customs clearance for imports or exports suspected of infringement, it is required to provide the additional information on the mode of import or export, country of exportation, mode of packaging, the lawful importer or exporter, features of lawfully imported or exported goods for distinction from infringing goods.

Overall, it is important to protect the intellectual property rights. Further, engaging with IP attorney in Vietnam will help the process efficiently from registration, managing the intellectual properties, protecting the intellectual property from infringement, and handling the disputes against the IP violators in Vietnam through administrative measures, civil litigation or even criminal prosecution.

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How to Dealing with Trademark Infringement in Vietnam

 

According to Vietnam law on intellectual property, when detecting the trademark infringement act, the trademark owner has the self-protection right includes (i) apply technological measures to prevent acts of trademark infringement (ii) request organization or individual who commits an act of trademark infringement of the holder to terminate such act, make a public apology or rectification, and compensate damages; (iii) request the competent authority to handle with acts of trademark infringement in accordance with the provisions of laws.

 

Trademark Infringement in Vietnam

Firstly, to apply the technological measures to prevent acts of trademark infringement measure, infringed party may give our the information related to original of emergence, trademark certificate, protection and duration scope and other information related to the right of trademark owner in order to inform that the infringed trademark are under protection warn the infringing party not to infringe. Besides, the owner of infringed trademark may use the technical means or measures to mark, identify, distinguish and protect the infringed trademark.

 

Secondly, the owner could also request organization or individual who commits an act of trademark infringement of the holder to terminate such act, make a public apology or rectification, and compensate damages. In particular, the trademark owners may themselves or authorize to individual or organization, IP attorney in Vietnam to send to the infringed party to stop the the infringement by indicating the information regarding origin of infringement, trademark certificate, protection scope, protection duration and set a reasonable period of time for the infringer to terminate the act of infringement. In addition, depending on the case and level of infringement, the written request will bear different content. It can be said that this is a prior-should-use measure before taking other measures including application of technological measures. If the violating party cooperates and stops the infringement, it will save time and money of both parties when not taking other stronger measures.

Thirdly, owner of trademark could request the competent authority to deal with acts of trademark infringement in accordance with the provisions of laws. When the trademark owner sends the request as mentioned above to infringing party, and, the violated party does not cooperate and continue the infringement, infringed party may sent a request to competent authority with the information such as: date of making the request; name and address of infringed party or their legal representative; name of receiving request authority; name and address of infringing party; name and address of the suspected violator in the case of request for temporary cessation of customs clearance for exports or imports suspected of infringement; brief information of infringed trademark and infringement; proposed measures to handle infringement; documents and evidence accompanying the request. Depending on the seriousness of the infringement, the petitioner may submit a request to the relevant authorities to apply administrative, civil, criminal or customs measures. Be noted that if the request is sent to custom authority for temporary cessation of customs clearance for imports or exports suspected of infringement, it is required to provide the additional information on the mode of import or export, country of exportation, mode of packaging, the lawful importer or exporter, features of lawfully imported or exported goods for distinction from infringing goods.

Overall, it is important to protect the intellectual property rights. Further, engaging with IP attorney in Vietnam will help the process efficiently from registration, managing the intellectual properties, protecting the intellectual property from infringement, and handling the disputes against the IP violators in Vietnam through administrative measures, civil litigation or even criminal prosecution.

ANT Lawyers is a law firm in Vietnam located in the business centers of Hanoi, Danang, Ho Chi Minh city. We provide convenient access to our clients. Please contact our lawyers in Vietnam for advice via email ant@antlawyers.vn or call our office at +84 28 730 86 529.

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How to Dealing with Trademark Infringement

According to Vietnam law on intellectual property, when detecting the trademark infringement act, the trademark owner has the self-protection right includes (i) apply technological measures to prevent acts of trademark infringement (ii) request organization or individual who commits an act of trademark infringement of the holder to terminate such act, make a public apology or rectification, and compensate damages; (iii) request the competent authority to handle with acts of trademark infringement in accordance with the provisions of laws.

Trademark Infringement in Vietnam

Firstly, to apply the technological measures to prevent acts of trademark infringement measure, infringed party may give our the information related to original of emergence, trademark certificate, protection and duration scope and other information related to the right of trademark owner in order to inform that the infringed trademark are under protection warn the infringing party not to infringe. Besides, the owner of infringed trademark may use the technical means or measures to mark, identify, distinguish and protect the infringed trademark.

Secondly, the owner could also request organization or individual who commits an act of trademark infringement of the holder to terminate such act, make a public apology or rectification, and compensate damages. In particular, the trademark owners may themselves or authorize to individual or organization, IP attorney in Vietnam to send to the infringed party to stop the the infringement by indicating the information regarding origin of infringement, trademark certificate, protection scope, protection duration and set a reasonable period of time for the infringer to terminate the act of infringement. In addition, depending on the case and level of infringement, the written request will bear different content. It can be said that this is a prior-should-use measure before taking other measures including application of technological measures. If the violating party cooperates and stops the infringement, it will save time and money of both parties when not taking other stronger measures.

Thirdly, owner of trademark could request the competent authority to deal with acts of trademark infringement in accordance with the provisions of laws. When the trademark owner sends the request as mentioned above to infringing party, and, the violated party does not cooperate and continue the infringement, infringed party may sent a request to competent authority with the information such as: date of making the request; name and address of infringed party or their legal representative; name of receiving request authority; name and address of infringing party; name and address of the suspected violator in the case of request for temporary cessation of customs clearance for exports or imports suspected of infringement; brief information of infringed trademark and infringement; proposed measures to handle infringement; documents and evidence accompanying the request. Depending on the seriousness of the infringement, the petitioner may submit a request to the relevant authorities to apply administrative, civil, criminal or customs measures. Be noted that if the request is sent to custom authority for temporary cessation of customs clearance for imports or exports suspected of infringement, it is required to provide the additional information on the mode of import or export, country of exportation, mode of packaging, the lawful importer or exporter, features of lawfully imported or exported goods for distinction from infringing goods.

Overall, it is important to protect the intellectual property rights. Further, engaging with IP attorney in Vietnam will help the process efficiently from registration, managing the intellectual properties, protecting theintellectual property from infringement, and handling the disputes against theIP violators in Vietnam through administrative measures, civil litigation or even criminal prosecution.

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The Note of New Provisions of Law on Planning Decree No.37/2019/ND-CP

The Law on Planning 2017 has been effective from January 01^st, 2019. On May 07^th, 2019, the Decree no. 37/2019/ND-CP details some articles of Law on planning is effective. This Decree details some articles of Law on Planning including the Article 15,17,19,24,25,26,27,30,40,41 and 49 of Law on Planning.

This Decree applies to organizations and individuals involved in the formulation, appraisal, decision or approval, announcement, implementation, assessment and adjustment of the planning under the national planning system and other relevant organizations and individuals.

Therefore, the time duration for formulation of the national comprehensive planning, national marine spatial planning and national land use planning is not over 30 months, since the day approving the planning task. In the case the national planning system and province planning system, the time duration is 24 months.

This Decree details the contents of planning need to be published on the mass media: A summary of the planning contents must be published at least 01 time on the first page of a printed newspaper or on the homepage of the online newspaper for at least 30 days; The planning contents must be announced on news programs and television channels of national radio and television stations or provincial television stations.

The announcement of planning contents is also carried out through the following forms: model display, planning maps; conferences and workshops to disseminate planning contents and plan implementation plans; publications such as books, atlas, introductory videos…

The Decree specifies the professional capacity of this planning consultancy organization not belonging to state agencies. Pursuant to the Law on Planning 2017, the power to organize planning formulation includes: The Government shall organize formulation of the national comprehensive planning, national marine spatial planning and national land use planning; The Prime Minister shall organize formulation of regional planning; Ministry and ministerial authorities shall organize formulation of national sector planning; The People’s Committees of provinces shall organize formulation of provincial planning. However, the planning organization, the Ministries and Ministerial authorities and local governments shall select a planning consultancy in accordance with regulations of the Law on Bidding. The planning consultancy shall have a legal status and satisfy qualification requirements applied to its assigned tasks in accordance with regulations of the Government is regulated at Article 4 Decree 37/2019/ND-CP includes the conditions as follow:

·         Planning consultancy organizations must have at least 01 consultant, who is the planning project manager and must have a university degree or higher in the discipline related to the planning to be established to meet the prescribed conditions and at least 05 consultants presided over the planning component or planning contents for the national sector planning and provincial planning to meet the prescribed conditions. Consultancy organizations that formulate planning components or planning contents for national and provincial planning must have at least one consultant meeting the prescribed conditions.

·         The Consultants who are managers of planning projects must have a university degree or higher in the discipline related to the planning, and have established at least 01 planning of the same planning level that needs to be elaborated or directly participated in set up at least 02 plans of the same planning level.

·         In case the national master plan is first established in Vietnam, the consultant who is the planning project manager must have a university degree or higher in the discipline related to the planning needed to be established and the owner has established at least 02 regional plans or planning for the inter-provincial river basin.

·         Consultants who lead the formulation of planning components or planning contents for national and provincial planning sectors must have a university degree or higher in a discipline related to the planning component or planning contents. It is necessary to set up and directly participate in setting up at least 01 planning of the same planning level.

·         If the national master plan is first established in Vietnam, the consultant who presides over the planning component or the planning content for the national sector planning must have a university degree or higher in the specialized field. relating to the planning component or the planning content to be prepared and presided over at least 01 planning or directly involved in setting up at least 02 regional or planning for the scope of the inter-river basin the provincial.

Organizations that meet the above requirements may conduct planning consultancy for competent state agencies for planning. In Chapter II of Decree 37/2019/ND-CP stipulating the issue of planning, in this chapter, the responsibilities of planning agencies, for each planning, will specify the responsibilities Specific agencies such as: Responsibilities of agencies that formulate national master plans, national maritime space planning, regional planning; Responsibilities of agencies organizing the formulation of planning components and agencies making planning components… prescribe the time limits, tasks and contents of planning, but the planning contents must comply with orientations and points and development objectives of socio-economic space, regional space, social and technical infrastructure… according to regulations, create uniform consistency and ensure sustainable development objectives.

The Decree details about the information system and the national database about planning at Chapter V of this Decree, includes the contents about information and database as follow:

The information, database of the information system and national database about planning and information, the database is digitized, linked, integrated with each other, linked to the national geographic database and appraised in accordance with the law.

The scale of implementing the construction of national geographic database is determined by district administrative units; use VN-2000 reference frame and coordinate system for all types of information, map database.

Information and database collected to build a national planning information and database system include:

·         Database of national planning documents, regional planning, provincial planning, specialized technical planning, special administrative – economic unit planning, urban planning and planning rural areas have been approved and stored according to Article 44 of the Law on Planning;

·         Specialized database managed by Ministries, Ministerial authorities, People’s Committees of provinces and cities under the central government, including national statistical database and national statistical indicators system, provincial, district and commune levels; database on water resources; database on geology and minerals; environmental database; database on meteorology and hydrology; database of marine and island environmental resources; database on climate change; land statistics and inventory database; database of land use planning and plans; information and databases related to basic land surveys; database on technical infrastructure systems; database on social infrastructure systems; database on construction; database on urban systems and rural population points; database on housing and real estate market; database on national defense and security; relevant measurement and mapping databases;

·         National geographic database is standardized and updated regularly;

·         Information and databases on other planning.

The Decree stipulating the planning contents must be announced on the mass media: notices on national radio and television news programs for national planning and regional planning or provincial radio and television stations for provincial plans on summarizing the contents of decisions or approving planning and lists of projects prioritized for investment in the planning period.

Planning law and construction law have a close relationship. An important principle of planning activities is to ensure stability, avoid disturbance to business and production activities of enterprises and people’s lives. Decree 37 is expected to help clarifying issues, reducing overlapping in relevant legal provisions.

ANT Lawyers attorneys, a law firm in Vietnam with offices in Hanoi, Ho Chi Minh City and Da Nang regularly monitor legal changes to update customers regularly.

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How to Handle Trademark Infringement in Vietnam?

Counterfeit destroys businesses, business environments, markets as well as the image of the country. Handling trademark infringement in Vietnam has been practically challenging.

Vietnam government has been trying to curb the counterfeits however the results are limited.  The counterfeit business generates huge profits due to the gap price anywhere in the world.   Almost goods which is either popular or luxury, high or low-value of either domestic or foreign brands are being counterfeited, imitated in Vietnam.  Falsification of household goods, food, cosmetics, shoes and items of higher value such as bags, watches, glasses, etc may be found all over Vietnam. For effective anti-counterfeit, we need a close cooperation among the authority agencies in inspection, control of production, import and circulation in the market.  The Southern Department of Goods Quality Control in Vietnam in one of its regular inspections when cooperating with competent agencies in Ho Chi Minh City found after checking 79 stores with 416 items including: oil, helmets, toys, electronic devices that 33.89% of goods of unsatisfactorily labeled, 14.5% unsatisfactory quality. Where the consumers buy counterfeit goods, they could and should report to State authorities, Anti-Counterfeit and Brand Protection Association as an effort to contribute to curbing counterfeit in Vietnam.  The international brands being infringed could request assistance from local law firms in Vietnam.

ANT Lawyers’ Intellectual Property lawyers in Vietnam have assisted a number of clients being foreign brands in its effort to protect their intellectual property and industrial property rights in Vietnam under Intellectual Property Law through advisory, and implementation service.

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How can I report a trademark infringement to the US Patent and Trademark Office?

Trademark law is a civil matter. So, if you see someone is infringing your trademark rights, your best option is to initially send them a cease and deist letter. If they don't respond or they refuse, your next course of action would usually be to initiate a lawsuit against them, to get them to stop the infringing activity.

Trademark Infringement in Vietnam

The USPTO does not directly deal with this matters. If, however, someone is trying to register a mark that you think is too similar to your trademark, then you can submit an opposition or file a cancelation with the USPTO. Again, these options only apply if the third party is trying to obtain federal trademark protection through an application.

Source: Quora

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