A recurring conversation in this practice begins with a founder saying that their brand is protected because the company is registered. It is not. Company registration at the Office of the Company Registrar prevents another company being incorporated under an identical name. It does nothing to stop a different business printing your brand on their products and selling them next to yours.
Trademark registration, handled by the Department of Industry, is the right that does that.
Search before you file
A search establishes whether a conflicting mark is already registered or applied for in the relevant class. It costs a fraction of a refused application and very much less than rebranding after packaging has been printed. It also produces something more useful than a yes or no: a realistic view of how strong the mark is and whether it is worth defending.
This is the point at which we sometimes advise against a mark entirely. Purely descriptive names are difficult to register and weak even when they succeed, because the registration will not stop competitors describing their own goods accurately. Distinctive marks are easier to register and far easier to enforce.
Choosing the class
Trademarks are registered for specified goods or services, grouped into classes. A registration in the wrong class protects something you do not sell. A business operating across categories, for example a company that both manufactures a product and provides a related service, may need more than one class to cover what it actually does.
Class selection should reflect the business as it will be in a few years, not only as it is today, because adding classes later means new applications with new dates.
Filing and the priority date
The application is filed with the mark exactly as it will be used, the list of goods or services, the applicant’s business documents and a power of attorney. The filing date establishes priority, which is why filing early matters considerably more than filing quickly in any other sense.
Examination, publication and objection
The application is examined and may attract objections, which are answerable. If it passes examination it is published, and during the publication period third parties may oppose the registration. Both stages are normal parts of the process rather than signs that something has gone wrong.
This is where the honest answer about timing sits. Filing takes days. Reaching a registration certificate takes many months, and an opposed application takes longer. Any adviser promising a registered trademark in a few weeks is describing the filing receipt, not the registration.
After registration
Registration is not permanent. Trademarks are renewed on a cycle, and a lapsed renewal can lose a right built over years of trading. Assignments, licences and changes of ownership should be recorded, because an unrecorded transfer creates a mismatch between who owns the business and who owns the mark.
Protection stops at the border
Trademark rights are territorial. A Nepali registration protects you in Nepal. Businesses exporting to India, the Gulf, Europe or elsewhere need protection in those jurisdictions, and the filing route differs by destination. This is worth planning before the export relationship begins rather than after a distributor registers your mark in their own name, which happens more often than it should.
If someone is already using your brand
The options depend on whether they have registered it and on who used it first. Opposition, cancellation, negotiated coexistence and infringement action are all available in the right circumstances. Which one fits is a question of evidence, particularly evidence of your own prior use, so the first thing to gather is dated proof of when and how you have been using the mark.
