Our company acts for the trademark “中直” (Zhong Zhi in Chinese) with reg. No. 13276994 under Class 36 “1. Financial service; 2. Financial consulting.”, applying for revocation on partial designated services. As per the review, China National Intellectual Property Administration held that, Dalian Lan Ao Technologies Co., Ltd., the register did not provide effective use evidence for the trademark, thus, the application for the revocation of the registered trademark shall be rejected. The applicant refused the decision and filed the application for the review, as per the final review, China National Intellectual Property Administration held that the chain of evidence which filed by Dalian Lan Ao Technologies Co., Ltd. was NOT adequate to shape the full chain of evidence to prove that, the company has used the reviewed trademark on the designated service, i.e. “1. Financial service; 2. Financial consulting” during the designated period according to the meaning indicated by Chinese Trademark Law 2013, cancelled the registration of the reviewed trademark on two services mentioned above.

Brief Comments:

I.Issue regarding the qualification of the main body of institutions engaging the financial service.

In this case, the reviewed trademark which applied for the revocation, was used on the “Financial services; Financial consulting” under the group 3602 “Financial issues”. The Classification explicitly stipulates that Class 36 mainly includes services offered by the financial business and currency business and services related to kinds of insurance agreements. However, institutions can offer financial services mentioned above should engage in the financial business after obtained the financial institution business license. The specific requirements related to the application and registered capital for the financial institution business license have clear stipulations. 

Regarding this case, the approved business scope of the respondent is “development and sale of computer software and hardware”; two licensed companies’ approved business scopes are “technologies development of agricultural and biological products” (Dalian Cishendao Biotechnology Co., Ltd.) and “agents of trademark issues” (Dalian Zhong Zhi Trademark Agency Co., Ltd.) All of three are not engage in financial business, furthermore, without any financial licenses issued by the People’s Bank of China, China Banking Regulatory Commission, China Securities Regulatory Commission, China Insurance Regulatory Commission and other financial supervision authorities. Thus, the respondent and the affiliated companies have no service qualification described by Class 36 “Financial services and Financial consulting”, furthermore, it is impossible to use the reviewed trademark on financial services as per the meaning described by the Trademark Law.

II.The documented evidence provided by the respondent and the affiliated companies are failed to effectively prove the reviewed trademark has been used on “Financial service; Financial consulting” as per the meaning described by the Trademark Law.

Among the evidence filed by the respondent in the course of argument of revocation of non-use for consecutive three-year and review, including the license agreement on the usage of trademark separately concluded with Dlian Zhong Zhi Trademark Agency Co., Ltd. and Dalian Cishendao Biotechnology Co., Ltd. However, in the absence of the support of other valid evidence, only the license agreement cannot form a completed chain of evidence, i.e. the agreements mentioned above cannot be proved to perform practically, or the authentic, effective and legal use of the reviewed trademark on the “Financial service; Financial consulting” in the designated period cannot be proved, as a result, the license agreement of the trademark should not be regarded as the usage of the trademark as per the meaning described by Chinese Trademark Law. 

In this case, China National Intellectual Property Administration has supported our agency’s opinion in the course of the review, moreover, revoked the registration of the reviewed trademark on “Financial services; Financial consulting”, it avoided the idle use of the registered trademark and reduced the waste of resources, furthermore, to encourage the practical and effective usage of the trademark.