KIPO Establishes Priority Examination Division for Service Trademarks... "Focused Support for Small Business Owners' Trademarks"

[Asia Economy (Daejeon) Reporter Jeong Il-woong] The Korean Intellectual Property Office (KIPO) will establish and operate the "Service Trademark Priority Examination Division" this month.

On the 4th, KIPO announced that to respond to the increasing number of priority examination requests in the service trademark field, it will utilize the autonomous organization system to establish and operate the "Service Trademark Priority Examination Division."

The autonomous organization system allows the head of an institution to establish and operate an organization by enacting internal regulations to promote national tasks and key projects.

The newly established Service Trademark Priority Examination Division will be responsible for handling priority examination requests in the retail and wholesale business (Class 35) and restaurant business (Class 43) sectors, which have the highest proportion among the priority examination requests received in the service industry (Classes 35 to 45).

KIPO established the Service Trademark Priority Examination Division reflecting the fact that as trademark applications have recently increased, examination processing times have been delayed, and the proportion of applicants requesting priority examination who desire faster examination has risen, especially with the service industry sector's share increasing every year.

In fact, the proportion of priority examination requests among total trademark applications increased from 4.3% in 2019 to 6.4% in 2020, 8.5% in 2021, and 11.5% as of November last year.

Also, the proportion of the service industry among total priority examination requests increased from 39.3% in 2019 to 43% in 2020, 44.9% in 2021, and 48.7% as of November last year, according to KIPO's data.

Above all, priority examination requests in the retail and wholesale and restaurant sectors showed an average annual growth rate of 63.9% from 2017 to 2021, which increased the need for a dedicated organization to respond.

Since small business owners (including individuals) have a high rate of requesting priority examination in the retail and wholesale and restaurant sectors (79.6% of all priority examination requests for Classes 35 and 43 from January to November last year), providing faster examination results was also a justification for establishing the dedicated division.

Lee In-sil, Commissioner of KIPO, said, "The newly established division will be responsible for handling priority examination requests in sectors such as retail and wholesale," adding, "Through this, KIPO expects that the processing speed of general service trademarks, which had relatively longer processing times, will also accelerate."

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