Using Registered Trademark Overseas

[Henrik99]

Hi All

I have a trademark UK registered trademark for my company logo. I therefore use the ® sign next to my logo on the website, collateral etc. I am shortly going to start marketing my product in the USA and EU. I presume but have not yet applied for a US or EU trademark but am in the process of doing both. I presume that in the near term there is not a problem with my continuing to use this registration mark as visitors to the website will be coming from these jurisdictions.

Best

Henrik

 

[F_B]

It is an offence (in the UK at least and probably other jurisdictions) to represent a mark as registered when it is not.

That said I've never known anyone be fined for falsely representing a mark as registered.

This is a grey area as your mark is registered in the UK, but is not in the other jurisdictions.

The safest thing to do would be to use the TM symbol instead. This can be used to denote any mark that is intended to be a trademark regardless of whether it is registered or not.

The use of the TM mark will likely achieve the same aim as using the registered symbol -to make it clear to third parties that the mark may be covered by a trademark.

 

[Henrik99]

Thanks, helpful.