Where URLs are requested below, it is preferred that either URLs which are likely to remain stable over time (three years or more) are provided, or home (main) page URLs are provided with a short explanation of how to access the corresponding information.
In 2005 SAKPATENTI received 1025 applications under the national procedure, which exceed by 254 the amount received in 2004 (771). Increase in the number equals to 32%. 604 trademarks were registered under the national procedure which exceed by 175 the amount registered in 2004, percentage being +40%.
2588 notifications were received on extension the trademarks to Georgia according to the Madrid Protocol of International Registration of Trademarks, which is less by the amount of 242 as compared with that received in 2004 (-8.5%).
2368 International marks were protected in 2005.
By December 31, 2005, 15836 national and 12578 International Marks were in force.
9 International Applications were submitted to the International Bureau in 2995under the Madrid Protocol of International Registration of Trademarks. Totally, 31 applications were submitted to the International Bureau by December 31, 2005.
All trademark documents are published in the Official Bulletin of Industrial Property, which is issued monthly. Documents are prepared in the personal workstations whereafter they are forwarded via Local Area Network to the Publication division where they are printed and copied using Rhysograph and Xerox copiers.
SAKPATENTI uses 8th edition of Nice Classification and 5th edition of the Viena classification for trademark registration purpose. The applicant is not required to use exact terms of the Nice Classification. Classification of figurative elements is done by the special examinner.
Identification of bibliographic data of trademarks are done with the use of three digit codes in accordance with the WIPO standard 60.
Other classification systems such as electronic classification system are not used so far.
All documents are also manually searchable on paper files, which are regularly updated.
-In-house system
Examination of trademark applications on similarity and identity are performed in the computer network. The database contains data of both national trademarks and trademarks extended to Georgia under international procedures.
-External databases
In the course of trademark examination the following databases are used also: the Madrid System databases for international registration – ROMARIN and Expressbases; Expressbase for symbols protected under Article 6-ter of The Paris Convention on Protection of the Industrial Property Rights; International non-protectible names database for pharmaceutical substances-INN Mednet; and Expressbase of Lisbon Agreement on International Registration of Appelations of Origine.
SAKPATENTI provides consultation services to all persons interested in legal matters and matters concerning the trademark application drafting and registration. Upon demand, it conducts searches in the trademarks database and search results are prepared in written form.
Sakpatenti continues to exchange trademark information in the form of Official Gazettes stored on CD discs with various intellectual Property Offices worldwide. The information is stored in MS Word format and are published on the Office Website in PDF format.
Education and training activities were in progress in 2005 too. The Office is well equipped with audiovisual means for conducting seminars and training courses. Power Point presentations were mainly used as visual means for training purposes.
Several examiners and staff members attended seminars abroad.
The Office continues to publish journal "Intellectual Property" containing papers on all spheres of intellectual property. It is published on paper and on the Website in PDF format (full texts). The authors of the papers are mainly the Office staff members. The journal provides great aid both to patent professionals and the public in obtaining useful educational materials.
Apart from publishing, the Office permanently provides consultations to applicants as concerns applications drafting, novelty searches, etc.