After being opened for the public consultation by The Turkish Patent Institute (“TPI”), the Draft Industrial Property Law (“Draft Law”) was sent to Turkish Parliament for the final vote. The Draft Law contains provisions on trademarks, patents, industrial designs and geographical indications which are currently addressed by separate Decree Laws.
The Draft Law clarifies and enacts some issues which have been developed by the courts and are accepted by TPI on the basis of…
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In order to comply with the codification system of the Turkish law further to the decisions of the Constitutional Court, a draft IP law (the Draft I Law) has been prepared by the Turkish Patent Institute (TPI) relating to all IP rights other than copyrights. On 24 February 2016, The Ministry of Science, Industry and Technology circulated the Draft Law on the TPI’s website, with the consultation ending on 4 March 2016.
When enacted, the Draft Law will replace the decree-laws…
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In 2014 the Istanbul IP Court held that second medical use claims granted by the European Patent Office (EPO) under the European Patent Convention 1973 were null and void (for further details please see “IP court finds second medical use claims to be medical treatment methods”). This surprising decision was the first issued by the IP Court and thus was closely followed by various stakeholders, particularly IP lawyers and pharma companies. In particular, Turkish patent law…
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On May 5 2016 the draft Industrial Property (Rights) Law passed the Ministry of Science, Industry and Technology commissions with minor amendments. One of the most debated issues was the application of the doctrine of international exhaustion of IP rights to all IP rights (for further details please see “Turkey poised to adopt doctrine of international exhaustion”).
Another hotly debated issue covered in the draft law is the inclusion of compulsory licensing provisions in the…
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Two decades after Turkey began adopting some EU-style IP legislation, the country is on the cusp of passing a new IP law. Guldeniz Dogan Alkan and Selin Sinem Erciyas examine the proposals.
Twenty years ago Turkey was in the process of becoming a part of the European Union-Turkey Customs Union and one of its responsibilities was to adapt its national intellectual property law to EU legislation. For that purpose, Turkey rapidly constituted decree laws relating to IP rights in…
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The Industrial Commission of the Turkish Grand National Assembly has approved the draft Industrial Property (Rights) Law, meaning that Turkey is poised to introduce the doctrine of international exhaustion of IP rights. This move is intended to address concerns regarding the ambiguous implementation of the doctrine, as well as its confusing interpretation by the courts and in literature, which allows the free parallel import and export of goods in and out of…
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Facts
In the first of two recent Turkish Patent Institute (TPI) decisions, the applicant filed a trademark application for the phrase ‘lana del rey’, seeking registration in Classes 25 and 35. The opponent – who had been using this phrase as her stage name for years and had become a world-renowned singer and songwriter under that name, and also had trademark registrations abroad for this phrase – filed an opposition against the application. The opposition was based on:
• the…
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The Turkish Parliament took the draft IP Law into its program on 6 April 2016 and plans to enact it in mid 2016. The draft law is promising as it mainly fulfils the aim to harmonize the national law with EU law and removes discrepancies between national law and international agreements of Turkey. On the other hand it appears that the legislator focused on the must provisions and refrained from ruling on any area more than necessary. The amendments brought to IP law are…
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The Turkish Patent Institute (TPI) shared die new Draft Industrial Property Code (the Draft Code) with the public at the end of February, collected remarks of the relevant stakeholders on it and the Draft Code has been sent onto the Parliament recently.
The Draft Code was introduced to the Turkish domestic law on 24 February 2016. The TPI shared it and allowed the stakeholders to convey their opinions within ten days.The period of consultation finished on 4 March 2016, there…
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Legal framework
Turkey is a party to most international IP-related treaties, including the Agreement on Trade-Related Aspects of Intellectual Property Rights (TRIPs), which aims to harmonise the legal framework for anti-counterfeiting and anti-piracy. Accordingly, Trademark Decree-Law 556 is almost fully compliant with TRIPs.
There are specialist civil and criminal IP courts in the three largest Turkish cities (Istanbul, Ankara and Izmir). In other cities the regular civil…
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Article 7/1(b) of the Trademark Decree-Law (556) provides for absolute refusal during the ex officio examination of the Turkish Patent Institute (TPI) by stating that a trademark “identical or indistinguishably similar to a trademark registered earlier or with an earlier filing date for registration in respect of identical or same type of products or services shall not be registered”. Pursuant to this provision, a trademark which is identical or indistinguishably similar to…
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Turkey’s Ministry of Science, Industry and Technology circulated a draft IP Code on the website of the Turkish Patent Institute (TPI) for the opinions of relevant stakeholders, which includes anyone who would like to comment, but chiefly Non-governmental Organizations, business sector associations, IP-focused associations and IP law firms on February 24, 2016.
The new IP Code that is being discussed consolidates the Turkish Decree-Laws on Trademarks, Patents, Industrial…
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