On March 31st, 2016, the new Industrial Property Code will come into force in Mozambique, approved by this country's Council of Ministers on 31st December 2015 (decree No.47/2015), which will revoke the previous Code, of 2006.
The main changes, which are set below, have to do mostly with the amendment of deadlines, of administrative and formatting issues, as well as with the clarification of certain sections, and there have not been many legal changes.
On a general level and applicable to all the administrative procedures, new deadlines must be pointed out: 30 days, instead of the previous 15, to submit pending documents (for example, powers of attorney); 30 days, but in this case replacing the previous 60 days, for filing appeals.
The Patent, Utility Model and Industrial Design applications may now suffer provisional refusals, which will be communicated to the applicants in five days, and there will a be a period of 30 days to file the eventual replies (in the absence of the same, the refusals will become final).
It will now be possible to file opposition against the granting of Utility Models and the opposition against the granting of Industrial Designs is also clarified (the oppositions can be filed by any person/entity who feels harmed, within 30 days after the publication of the granting).
On what concerns Trademarks, the new Industrial Property Code foresees to extend the exam of Trademarks in relation to identical or similar products and/or services and the deadline for filing oppositions is reduced from 60 to 30 days after the publication date.
The IP Bulletin, which has been published every two months until now, will now be published monthly.
Originally published March 10, 2016
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