News

As we informed in our Newsletter # 2, dated January 2014, in October 2013, the Brazilian Patent Office (“INPI”) enacted Resolution No. 113 to regulate the control of the payment of annuities by patent and patent application owners. Immediately, the Resolution triggered strong reactions from patentees and patent attorneys, in view of its item 13, which contradicts Sections 86 and 87 of the country’s Industrial Property Act (Law No. 9,279/96). It is estimated that such contradiction may have jeopardized the rights of applicants and patentees over almost 10,000 issued patents and 2,300 patent applications.

According to the IP Act, failure to pay annuities shall lead to the shelving of the application or the extinction of the patent (article 86). However, Section 87 allows the restoration of the application or of the patent upon request of the corresponding owner within 3 (three) months from the moment the INPI publishes the notification of shelving or extinction.

Kasznar Leonardos is now a German Desk certified office, which means it counts on German speaker professionals who are ready to meet the needs of German companies that may be looking for IP service providers in Brazil.

Dear Colleagues, please feel free to share the presentation video of the ABPI Congress.

Dear Colleagues, please feel free to share the presentation video of the ABPI Congress.

Dear Colleagues, please feel free to share the presentation video of the ABPI Congress.

Launched on April 2012, the Brazilian Patent Office’s pilot program that establishes prioritized examination for the so-called “green patents” has now been extended for a further year, being available up to April 16, 2015.

This program’s purpose is to prioritize the examination procedures of patent applications involving “green technologies”, reducing the current average time for concluding the examination of patent applications – which currently takes more than 10 years – to a promised lag time of about 2 years.

Until now, only Paris Convention filed applications, or Brazilian originated national applications, were eligible to enter into this special program.

The big novelty in extending the “green patents” program is that, in this new phase, also Brazilian national phases of PCT applications can benefit from this prioritized route. These can be either new patent applications, still to be filed, or pending patent applications, already filed at the Brazilian Patent Office. For

Partner João Luis Vianna represented Kasznar Leonardos at the BIO International Convention 2014, which took place in San Diego, California, from June 23rd to the 26th. Kasznar Leonardos was a member of the Brazil Pavilion, where João appears below, between Estevão Mano (left) and Norberto Prestes (right), both from the BIO-RIO Foundation. The BIO Convention 2014 had a welcoming reception inside an american aircraft carrier and, yesterday, there was a lunch with lecture by the former US Secretary of State, Hillary Clinton.

The past couple of years have seen some major developments in how Brazilian courts interpret and enforce trademark law at all levels. This article reviews some of the latest changes related to protection for non-traditional trademarks, the special rule for determining jurisdiction in trademark infringement cases and the administrative seizure of counterfeits by Customs.

The 1996 Brazilian Industrial Property Act (9,279/96) establishes a mixed trademark protection system by which an attributive arrangement grants first-to-file protection rights along with some declaratory system exceptions, such as *bona fide* six-month prior use of an unregistered trademark. Despite general satisfaction with this system, it is a fact that the law admits only the registration of visual-perceptive signs as trademarks (Section 122).

However, this limitation does not mean that non-visual signs which function as trademarks are bereft of protection. The Industrial Property Act sets out a so-called ‘gen

The growth of the Brazilian market and economy is paralleled by the increase in counterfeiting activities. The enforcement of IP rights involves planning, technology, intelligence, training and coordination, with support from a number of laws and treaties, as well as the relevant rules of the Federal Constitution, the Civil Code, the Criminal Code, the Civil Procedure Code, the Criminal Procedure Code and administrative statutory instruments.

The legal framework for anti-counterfeiting includes:

• the Industrial Property Law (9,279/96);

• the Copyright Law (9,610/98); and

• the Software Law (9,609/98).

In addition, Brazil is a signatory to the main international IP instruments, such as:

• the Paris Convention for the Protection of Industrial Property (as reviewed in Stockholm in 1967);

• the Agreement on Trade-Related Aspects of IP Rights (TRIPs);

• the Berne Convention for the Protection of Literary and Artisti

Despite being usually seen as comparable parts of the BRICs , the emerging economies of China and Brazil have more differences than similarities, not to mention the countries’ historic and cultural backgrounds. Ever since the creation of the World Trade Organization (WTO), China has impressed the world with very good indicators: substantial and steady increase in its GDP, relevant internal market, increasing participation in global trade, impressive rates of innovation and an environment that is globally much welcoming to foreign investment. Brazil, on its side, has managed to surpass economic chaos caused by hyperinflation in the beginning of the 1990s and to create a market that is both friendly to foreign investments and strongly responsive to its internal demands, after years of economic stagnancy. Both countries are heralded as strong healthy economies, with a good share of natural resources and good perspectives for the future. On the verge of organizing two major sports events in the window of two

Despite being usually seen as comparable parts of the BRICs , the emerging economies of China and Brazil have more differences than similarities, not to mention the countries’ historic and cultural backgrounds. Ever since the creation of the World Trade Organization (WTO), China has impressed the world with very good indicators: substantial and steady increase in its GDP, relevant internal market, increasing participation in global trade, impressive rates of innovation and an environment that is globally much welcoming to foreign investment. Brazil, on its side, has managed to surpass economic chaos caused by hyperinflation in the beginning of the 1990s and to create a market that is both friendly to foreign investments and strongly responsive to its internal demands, after years of economic stagnancy. Both countries are heralded as strong healthy economies, with a good share of natural resources and good perspectives for the future. On the verge of organizing two major sports events in the window of two

Despite being usually seen as comparable parts of the BRICs , the emerging economies of China and Brazil have more differences than similarities, not to mention the countries’ historic and cultural backgrounds. Ever since the creation of the World Trade Organization (WTO), China has impressed the world with very good indicators: substantial and steady increase in its GDP, relevant internal market, increasing participation in global trade, impressive rates of innovation and an environment that is globally much welcoming to foreign investment. Brazil, on its side, has managed to surpass economic chaos caused by hyperinflation in the beginning of the 1990s and to create a market that is both friendly to foreign investments and strongly responsive to its internal demands, after years of economic stagnancy. Both countries are heralded as strong healthy economies, with a good share of natural resources and good perspectives for the future. On the verge of organizing two major sports events in the window of two

1 What are the principal statutes regulating advertising generally?

The legal basis for the provision of advertisement regulation is set forth by the 1988 Brazilian Constitution, which determines that the law will provide for special rules on the advertising of products and services that may offer health and environmental risks, such as tobacco, alcohol and medicines (section 220, paragraph 3, II, and paragraph 4).

INTA Bulletin. Vol. 69 No. 7.

Revista Marcasur. Suplemento Brasil Al Día. Março, 2014.

La inseguridad jurídica que existe en Brasil es tanta que un dicho burlesco dice que “en Brasil hasta el pasado es incierto”. Un ejemplo de reciente conducta del Instituto Nacional da Propriedade Industrial (INPI) que generó perplejidad fue la presentación de acciones de nulidad de las patentes mailbox.