NEW OHIM WEBSITE PROJECT USER WORKING GROUP

Transcription

1 Meeting Minutes NEW OHIM WEBSITE PROJECT USER WORKING GROUP 4 th October 2012 Contact person: Nicolas Vigneron ext Katerina Casanova ext. 8717

2 Representatives from NGO: Mrs Helen Wheeler: GSK Senior Trade Mark Paralegal Legal: Global Trade Marks for EFPIA Dr Michael Schaeffer: Member of the Executive Committee and of the Special Committee for Competition and Trademark Law for Ms Sylvie Martins: IBM for APRAM Ms Marie-Laure Bonnaffous: L Oréal for Mrs Sofia Martinez-Almeida: Partner of the IP Department of Gomez-Acebo & Pombo, Second Vice- Chair of Marques Trademark Law and Practice Team for Marques Mr João Pimenta: Trademarks Commission Member for UNION Ms Catherine Montheil: P&G for BUSINESSEUROPE Mr Pedro Sugrañes: Member of CET 1 Representative for FICPI Ms Sabine Erkens: Representative for UEAPME Mr José María Penalva Hogan Lovells for ECTA Excused: Dr Martina Eberle: BASF AG Vice President Global Intellectual Property for ICC Dr. Alexander Dröge: Leiter Recht & Verbraucherpolitik for Markenverband Mr David Gill: DaWei-IP Director for INTA Representatives from OHIM: Ms Ingrid Desrois: OHIM Advisor Mr Nicolas Vigneron: Project Manager Ms Sonia Perez: Project Lead Mr Kristian Cooper: Project Lead Mr David Garcia Dorvau: Usability Team Lead Mr Xavier Sorribas: Usability Expert Ms Esther Verheul: Functional Architect Ms Katerina Casanova: Project Support Mr Francois Capcarrere: Head of Opposition Proceedings Sector Ms Alexandra Apostolakis: Head of Service Register & Fees Mr Juan Lacort: Communication Service Ms Alexandra Poch: ICLAD

3 Website Project Presentation by Nicolas Vigneron Attachment 1 Presentation Website Update A presentation was given by Nicolas Vigneron on the project status. ECTA/ Ingrid Desrois How is the roadshow planned to be organised? Who will it be aimed at? requested consider at least 4 month notice is needed. Recommends planning the sessions in different cities but limiting it to 1 day only. When are the workshops planned for before or after go live, should be after the go live as users would like to see something that s actually working already. When the promotion of the new web and features will start and how will it be communicated? Will there be a dedicated team to answer questions after go live? How many volunteers are needed where and when will they be trained? 1 day training sessions are the best option but running simultaneously in different countries. Comments from project team: We would like to receive names of volunteers by end of next week 12 th October that can attend training and test the systems at the end of November beginning of December. Max volunteers are needed. Location for the training of volunteers will depend on where these volunteers are based. However, volunteers are mainly expected to be users of the working group since they already have the knowledge of the project. Communication will start from around Jan/Feb 2013 and workshops to the wider user group are planned from around March to be confirmed. Presentation of the new Features 1. Case law Search by Sonia Perez Attachment 2 Website User Work Group Case law pdf What is enforcement case law? Are national courts decisions for community TM and Designs included? The name is not very clear to what the product actually delivers. Why isn t there a link between the OHIM decision databases and the National Courts decisions?

4 Ingrid Desrois APRAM MARQUES What kind of keywords will be used? How this issue will be addressed? A system that organises documents with keywords/indexing is very important because only via parties and dates it will be very hard, if not impossible to find a lot of the decisions. Recommends analysing how the indexing is dealt with in each country by the magazines as they publish all decisions. Norms and keywords are very important. Expected to see 2 sub-sections: administrative decisions and court decisions. On Observatory website there should be a clear sign that you can search court decisions here. Application number and registration number should be used for referencing as they are unique, besides if the word is spelt in different ways not all decisions can be seen for the same trademark. What will be the keywords availability in other languages for enforcement? The word enforcement can t be translated to many languages easily. Recommends that it should be renamed. If it will be part of the Observatory website will there be a link from the main OHIM website? How can the keywords be translated? Will google translator be offered or other means? Will you be able to see if it s a final decision? Is it possible to search by goods and services? It s not clear enough, as to what the search covers. Is full text and keywords search available? One should have the ability to search by trademark name. EFPIA It s suggested that the parties field will be replaced by regulation (norms). It would be more useful to have the regulation (norms) because it relates to the key article. Can you search goods and services at the moment? BUSINESS EUROPE//APRAM ECTA Having to go to two different places in order to search decisions is confusing and not userfriendly. Can one navigate by both trade mark and decision?

5 Comments from project team: Case law enables one to search for community trade mark and community design courts decisions for CTM/RCD related cases. The Observatory and OHIM Websites will be linked. The case law project is a project of the Observatory. The 1 st phase is to add to a search tool all the decisions the Office receives from national courts and to tag them. Basic search is available aiming to cover the most common search criteria whilst an advanced search will give further search criteria. The OHIM took note of the suggestions/recommendations for improvement. Office decisions will be in esearch and is not linked to the enforcement national case law. OHIM case law database will be available in all EU languages with the keywords translated but not the decisions. The enforcement will be done in the 5 main European languages. As to the follow-up of the implementation of the new website: the OHIM is considering to increase the staff number for answering s/requests as well as be available on a dedicated hotline. 2. Manual by Nicolas Vigneron Ingrid Desrois APRAM MARQUES Attachment 3 Presentation Website Manual Do you need OHIM account to access the manual? Will you see previous versions of the documents? Does the manual and regulation have any link with case law decisions? Where do you add comments and who does it go to? The OHIM internal Db for goods and services should be made available to users for comparison of goods and services. Until then, is there any way the users can submit a demand for goods/services comparison under OHIM practice (to the Information Center or other)? Will goods and services database be available to users? There is a need for a simpler access to FAQ as not easy to navigate to at the moment. Comments from project team: The manual is not restricted to registered users, however there are some extra features that can only be accessed with a user account. E.g. alerts, share. You will be able to see the changes between the previous and current version.

6 The approach used for keyword tagging will be consistent in both manual and decisions. Therefore, navigation from Manual to Case Law will be available. The envisioned use of the comments is to collect feedback and share information but no formal decision have been taken yet. The manual will be available in 5 main European languages next year. 3. Website Navigation and Content by Kristian Cooper Attachment 4 Content Navigation Presentation Most users prefer the nature theme with the colors as the sections are more defined. Your products appears in the menu path, what does this mean? The use of Protect is better than the word Enforce in the menu structure. Why isn t there a separate link to office case law and national case law? BUSINESS EUROPE Legislation should be moved before Practice in the law and practice menu EFPIA What does work refer to on the Practice menu? UEAPME It is not very clear from the structure where all regulations and legislation can be found. Headings should be included as just the name case law is not descriptive enough. Comments from project team: The trade mark and design content which appears on the website is aimed at non-professional users therefore the term your products is because we felt that it was more intuitive to this user sector. It has been suggested that the wording should be changed to Your business or Your products and services. Other suggestions on language and terminology improvements will be integrated. Workshop of the User Area by David Garcia Dorvau and Xavier Sorribas Attachment 5 screenshots of the application Dashboard/Communications/App Drafts/Alerts/ Delegations

7 Additional elements should be included. It would be better if you could find all national/international registrations also and you could link it to your user area. Not enough possibilities to make links in your own system. Link between the series of CTMs. Will you receive all OHIM communication via this system even if it s only as evidence? Will this be the official notification? If the letter column is omitted, then one has to go into the detail of each communication to see it. This is not very convenient. Re-name the column letter. Can I set alerts for any new CTM? The delegation section should be explained in detail to big firms where this will likely be used. BUSINESS EUROPE ECTA Representation what does it refer to? Repres. By and Representation fields should be renamed to be a bit more clear. Trade mark and Registered design names are suggested. Where do you need to click, in order to communicate with OHIM office? Can you search and add new columns? Can you see owners name? Letter reference is not very informative. The File ID (CTM Number) is more important. Will renewal manager still exist? What happens when you click in the link in the alert you receive? Is it possible to have the option to load previous e-oppo data? Other than CTM/RCD/OPPO what additional actions will be available in my files? FICPI APRAM EFPIA What criteria is used by the renewal filter? At what period will a renewal appear in the list? How will you know if you have communication? Do you have to go to your user area? How do you set the alerts? It s missing the trademark in the Will the Alert setting cover any new CTM, WIPO? The reference field should be renamed. Comments from project team: The renewal manager is part of the new harmonized e-filing form which gathers other actions such as inspection, conversion or recordals.

8 The user area only gathers OHIM data. There are no plans to add information of the national systems. Communications through the user area are official and the information as complete as offline communications. IR trade marks are included in our systems and will be part of the user are as well as direct CTM s. The following areas of the user area prototypes and wireframes were discussed: Dashboard (my files), Communications, Application Drafts, Alerts and Delegations (Business Partner Group). Comments will be analyzed and carried out if necessary. Wrap Up of the day by Ingrid Desrois Main points of the day: Good news that there is extra time to complete the project Major challenge is to get the information and right training to all users Case law databases are very interesting but ultimate aim for OHIM should be to merge the different case law databases Include the decisions of national offices and courts For the manual : educate users to fully benefit from this tool The user area will need time to fully test but the alerts and communications are good ideas Other comments from the Users: Who is responsible for content and when it will be available? o It will be after November in English Law and Practice section needs clarification if it relates to CTM or RCD What does Observatory stands for? Will it be made clear to SMEs? o Yes the website is made for general public citizens and SMEs. Extra Sessions: In the extra sessions in the afternoon the following subjects were discussed Declarations to Customs Form Harmonized e-filing Registration Process Observatory