Introduction China has completed the most consequential rewrite of its Trademark Law in over a decade. On June 26, 2026, the 23rd Meeting of the Standing Committee of the Fourteenth National People's Congress adopted a comprehensive revision of the Trademark Law of the People's Republic of China — the fifth amendment since the law was first enacted in 1982, and the first substantive overhaul since the narrow 2019 revision. The revised law, comprising 87 articles across nine chapters (up from 73 articles in eight chapters under the outgoing law), will enter into force on January 1, 2027. Trademarks registered before that date remain valid. For brand owners, in-house counsel, and IP practitioners with China exposure, this is not a routine update. The revision touches registration standards, opposition timelines, well-known mark protection, damages calculations, and — perhaps most significantly — the treatment of bad-faith and speculative filings that have long troubled foreig...
Summary The Calcutta High Court has appointed Adv. Adarsh Ramanujan as amicus curiae to comprehensively address the registrability of Graphical User Interfaces (GUIs) under the Designs Act, 1970, following repeated rejections by the Indian Patent Office despite previous judicial guidance favoring GUI design protection. Background The Calcutta High Court appears determined to definitively resolve the contentious issue of GUI registrability under the Designs Act, 1970. In Erbe Elektromedizin GmbH v. The Controller of Patents (IPDAID/22/2024), the Court appointed Adv. Adarsh Ramanujan as amicus curiae to assist in determining questions concerning GUI design registration. This development follows the Court's earlier ruling in Ust Global (Singapore) Pte Ltd v. The Controller of Patents and Designs , where it indicated that GUIs are registrable as designs and remanded the matter to the Indian Patent Office (IPO) for reconsideration. However, upon re-examination, the C...