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To protect DISTINCTIVE SIGNS, trademarks and trade names are granted.
Registered trademarks grant the right to the exclusive use of a sign to identify a product or
a service in the market; and may consist of words or combinations thereof, images, gures,
symbols, graphics, letters, numbers, three-dimensional forms (wrappers, packages, and so
on), and even sounds.
A trade name is a title that gives the owner exclusive rights over the use of any sign or
name used to identify a company in commercial trade. As in the case of Industrial Property
titles, trade names are independent from the company names registered with the Mercantile
Registry.
The protection of Distinctive Signs lasts 10 years and may be renewed indenitely for
periods of equal duration.
SHAPE CREATIONS are protected as industrial designs, which grant the exclusive right
over the appearance of all or part of a product in reference to the characteristics of its lines,
contours or shape, or ornamentation. The term of protection is ve years from the time of
application, which can be renewed for additional ve-year terms, up to a maximum of
twenty-ve years.
03 What is Technology Intelligence?
The SPTO possesses a large volume of technological and business information
unique in Spain for its content, since it includes full documentation on patents, utility
models, industrial designs, trademarks, and trade names.
This body of information was accumulated by the SPTO over the years in its function as a
registrar and is made available to all interested parties through a set of Technological
Information Services. Apart from acting as registrar, the SPTO has the mission of
disseminating this information to promote and support technological development and
economic growth.
To full what needs or ends are Technology Information Services normally sought?
• To determine the legal status of any application
• To assess the State of the Art in a given domain of technology
• To monitor the competitive environment with respect to ongoing developments in
technology and business
• To adopt a tool enabling monitoring of technological developments
• To identify brands and signs used on the market and gauge the chances for
obtaining approval of new signs
• To serve as a source of ideas to stimulate innovation and technological development