Starting March 26th, 2013, in accordance with the most recent Trademark Clearinghouse Guidelines published in February 2013, owners of registered trade-marks, certain court validated common law marks and marks protected by statute or treaty may begin registering those marks in the Trademark Clearinghouse. The Trademark Clearinghouse is a central repository for information to be authenticated, stored, and disseminated, pertaining to the rights of trade-mark holders. The Trademark Clearinghouse has two primary functions: (i) authentication and validation of the trade-marks in the Clearinghouse; and (ii) serving as a database to provide information to the new gTLD registries to support pre-launch sunrise or trade-mark claims services.

Registration of your company's valuable brands in the Trademark Clearinghouse is a proactive step to protect your brands online as the domain space expands with the new generic top level domains (gTLDs). Registration in the Trademark Clearinghouse will provide your company with the following key advantages:

  1. Claims Notification: Rights holders that have registered trade-marks in the Trademark Clearinghouse will be notified if a party attempts to register a second level domain that is identical to one of their marks. Is there recognition in the relevant sector of the public of the mark corresponding to the gTLD, as the mark of your organization, of the gTLD applicant or of a third party?
  2. Participation in Sunrise Periods: Registration in the Trademark Clearinghouse provides a rights holder with the exclusive ability to take advantage of registration of domain names, corresponding to the marks they have registered in the Trademark Clearinghouse, in the new gTLDs prior to those domains being made available to the public.

The fees for registration are currently $150 for one year, $435 for three years and $725 for a five year registration, bulk registrations may also be subject to discount pricing. Included in the registration fees charged by the Trademark Clearinghouse is linking of domain names to registrations, trademark claims notification services and the option to opt in or out of sunrise periods.

Registration in the Trademark Clearinghouse is a proactive step your company can take to protect its trade-marks online.

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