Kenya’s Industrial Property Institute (KIPI) has issued a special notice to remove over 2000 trademarks from the register of Trade Marks. KIPI said that the trademarks have expired and need to be renewed within 30 days.
Section 23 of the Trade Act stipulates that registration of a trademark in Kenya shall expire after a period of ten (10) years. The Act allows the proprietor of a registered trademark to make an application for renewal of the trademark.
Rule 65 of the Trade Mark Rules provides that where no application for renewal of a registered trade mark is received upon expiry of the ten year period, the Registrar of Trade Marks shall notify the proprietor of this fact. Where no application for renewal of the registered trade mark is received within a period of sixty (60) days from the date of the notice for renewal by the Registrar, rule 67 of the Trade Mark Rules requires the Registrar of Trade Marks to publish this fact.
Therefore, the latest update from KIPI says that the proprietors of the over 2000 trade marks were duly notified but failed to file applications for renewal of their respective trademarks.
In this case;
- Where the proprietor of a registered trade mark makes an application for renewal of a mark that has been published herein and pays the renewal fee together with the additional prescribed late renewal fee within thirty (30) days from the date of this publication, the trade mark shall be renewed and shall not be removed from the Register of Trade Marks
- Where no application for renewal of a trade mark published herein is received within thirty (30) days from the date of this publication, the trade mark shall be forthwith removed from the Register of Trade Marks
- Once the trade mark is removed from the Register of Trade Marks, the proprietor may thereafter make an application for renewal of the mark upon payment of the prescribed renewal fee together with the additional prescribed restoration fee. The trade mark shall then be restored to the Register of Trade Marks.
Some of the affected trademarks are listed here.
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