New Zealand’s accession to the Singapore Treaty was effected by the Trade Marks Amendment Regulations 2012. Amongst other changes the amendment regulations inserted regulation 62A to the Trade Mark Regulations 2003 allowing for continued processing of an abandoned application where the expired deadline is less than 2-months ago provided all outstanding objections are dealt with in the continued processing application. IPONZ has now updated its related practice note. The initial practice note allowed for revocation of a subsequently accepted mark. However, IPONZ has now acknowledged that there is no legislative basis for such revocation of acceptance. The new practice note states that a successful continued processing application can result in 2 marks that are the same or similar coexisting on the register. IPONZ will inform both parties of the coexistence, and the owner of the first filed mark will need to bring proceedings if coexistence is untenable.
