January 12, 2017 European Trademark and Design Network

Switzerland implements CP5 Common Practice

As of 1st January 2017, the Swiss Federal Institute of Intellectual Property (IPI) became the 29th IP Office to implement the CP5 Common Practice on the Common Practice of Relative Grounds of Refusal – Likelihood of Confusion (Impact of non-distinctive/weak components) into its guidelines.

The CP5 common principles have been incorporated into the updated version of IPI’s guidelines, which came into force on 1 January 2017. Users were informed of the implementation via an explanatory note published on the IPI website, which listed all the changes in the updated guidelines, an article in the IPI Newsletter and a footnote in the guidelines themselves.