Trademark Protection Costs in Europe: Southern Europe

By: Anthony De Andrade

In our previous article, Patent Protection Costs in Europe: Southern Europe, we illuminated the costs of protecting inventions and innovations (i.e., the costs of patent protection) in the Southern European economies of Greece, Italy, Portugal, and Spain. In this article, we shall delve into the costs of brand protection (i.e., the costs of trademark filing and registration) in the top Southern European economies.

Southern Europe

For the purposes of this article, the region of Southern Europe refers to the region encompassing the following countries and territories: Albania, Andorra, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Croatia, Gibraltar, Greece, Italy, Malta, Montenegro, Portugal, San Marino, Serbia, Slovenia, Spain, the Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia, and Kosovo. This classification is in line with that followed by the Department of Economic and Social Affairs of the United Nations.

Trademark Filings in Southern Europe

In the year 2016, the National Intellectual Property/Trademark Offices of Albania, Andorra, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Croatia, Greece, Italy, Malta, Montenegro, Portugal, San Marino, Serbia, Slovenia, Spain, and Macedonia collectively received close to 275,000 trademark applications, with about two-thirds of the total trademark applications being filed with the Italian Patent and Trademark Office and the Spanish Patent and Trademark Office. Along with Italy and Spain, Portugal was the only other jurisdiction to receive more than 25,000 trademark applications.

However, as the countries of Croatia, Greece, Italy, Malta, Portugal, Slovenia, and Spain are also members of the European Union, European Union Trademarks registered by the European Union Intellectual Property Office are also valid in these jurisdictions. The European Union Intellectual Property Office received 369,970 trademark applications in 2016. These figures are based on the numbers in the World Intellectual Property Indicators 2017 report published by the World Intellectual Property Organization.

How Much Does Trademark Protection Cost in Southern Europe?

Let us now discuss the costs involved in protecting trademarks in the top three Southern European economies (i.e., Italy, Portugal, and Spain) and, subsequently, getting them registered. Typically, there are three categories of costs involved: official fees, attorney charges, and translation costs.

The costs are generally dependent on the number of classes of goods and services under which the trademark application is filed. The current version of the ‘International Classification of Goods and Services’ (Nice Agreement Eleventh Edition — Version 2018) contains 34 classes for goods and 11 classes for services.

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