On October 17th, according to American media reports, Apple is notoriously secretive about product release, but this technology giant must do one thing before releasing its products: submit trademark documents in Jamaica. On Siri, AppleWatch, MacOS and many other important products, Apple submitted documents in Jamaica several months in advance, and then submitted the same documents in the United States.
Google, Amazon and Microsoft also filed trademark applications for their most important products in places far away from Silicon Valley and Seattle, including Jamaica, Tonga, Iceland, South Africa and Trinidad and Tobago-the trademark administrations in these places do not maintain easily searchable databases. The technology giant used a clause in the American trademark law to secretly apply for a trademark. According to the US Trademark Law, once the trademark is submitted by an intellectual property agency outside the United States, the company can have six months to apply to the US Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO).
when a company applies in the United States, it can prove that it has priority by presenting its original application abroad. However, this clause of American trademark law also prevents competitors from guessing the company's product plan from the public application documents. NehalMadhani, a lawyer at AltLegal who studies this issue, said: "Competitors may search for' what trademark is Apple applying for' and' what are they thinking'." Of course, applying overseas can't be really confidential-it's just not easy to visit because you have to go there in person. For example, Jamaica Intellectual Property Office allows visitors to search for application documents in its Kingston office.
people can also ask the office to search for documents for them, but they need to provide the address of Jamaica to receive the search results, which takes three weeks. But people can hire Jamaican lawyers to search. Jamaica Intellectual Property Office has no plans to put the document database online. AltLegal listed 65 other countries with the same offline trademark database. Every technology company seems to like to apply for a trademark in a specific country. As can be seen from the registration data since 21, Amazon, Apple, Google and Microsoft all applied for trademarks for the first time in different countries.
The data shows that Apple likes to apply for a trademark in Jamaica, with a total of 275 times. Google likes to apply in Tonga for 47 times, and Microsoft likes to apply in South Africa for 71 times. The special clause used by technology giants is Article 44(d) of the US Trademark Law, from which some companies benefit more. For example, Apple has applied three times more than Google. Some companies hide their trademarks more than others. For example, Apple has 343 registered trademarks abroad, Google has only 93, Microsoft has 8, Amazon has 42, Intel has 3 and IBM has 3.
but not many companies use this clause, and the high cost makes it worthwhile for only these big technology companies to do so. Madani of AltLegal Law Office said: "I don't see this method being widely used-I think it's quite a secret method. Usually only those companies with real legal resources will use it and are willing to spend money to protect something for six months. " But in science and technology, six months really has an advantage. Companies such as Apple can apply for trademark protection in Jamaica, pay taxes in Ireland and establish a global data distribution network that is beginning to transmit more traffic than the Internet.
when it comes to big technology companies, national boundaries seem to become bureaucratic obstacles that another technology company can bypass-but few companies can. apple