CIPO Now Accepting Sound Trademarks

A ground breaking federal Court of Canada decision has allowed for the trademarking of sounds. CIPO (Canadian Intellectual Property Office) has been resistant to sound trademarks and, up until this point, only allowed words or designs to be trademarked, even though many other countries have already allowed for sound to receive the same protection.

The decision has come from a long and drawn out court case between Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer (MGM) Studios and CIPO. In 1992 MGM applied to trademark the sound of the lion’s roar that viewers hear before any MGM movie. CIPO, after years of delays, eventually denied the trademark application for MGM’s lion roar and MGM appealed the decision.  The case made its way at the federal Court of Canada where MGM won. Because of the ruling, CIPO announced that it will now be accepting sound trademark applications.

Sound trademarks can be considered a kind of “aural brand” in that the sound you hear can instantly trigger the thought of a brand. Besides the MGM lion’s roar, other sounds that have been trademarked by brands in the US include the NBC chimes, the Intel Pentium chord sequence, the 20^th Century Fox music and the Harlem Globetrotter’s theme music. However, in Canada the sound trademark does not extend to longer sounds like songs, which would instead be protected by copyright.

To submit a sound mark in Canada, your application must include:

a.      a statement that the application is for a sound mark registration;

b.     a visual depiction that graphically represents the sound;

c.      a description of the sound; and

d.     an electronic recording of the sound in MP3 or WAV format or on CD or DVD (5 MB max.)

The recording should not contain any looping or repetition of the sound. Types of media other than listed above, hyperlinks, or streaming locations will not be accepted.  New applications for sound marks can only be submitted through a paper application, and not by CIPO's online filing system.

For more information on sound marks visit the CIPO website.

Video Series - PatsyPie Trademark

PatsyPie - Trademark Application Filing Services

PatsyPie is a bakery specializing in gluten-free products such as cookies, brownies and biscotti. Started as a home business in St. Laurent, Quebec by Pat Libling, PatsyPie has grown tremendously, with products now being sold across Canada.

PatsyPie was started because Pat herself is celiac. Over the years Pat has tried practically every gluten-free product on the market but found that none of the products measured up to the quality and taste of regular baked goods. So Pat set out to perfect her gluten-free recipes and once she did, she was in business!

For Pat, finding a creative and original name for her company was easy - PatsyPie is a nickname her husband gave her years ago. As PatsyPie started to become a successful business, Pat knew she needed to protect her company name and logo, so she turned to CorporationCentre.ca to register her Trademark.

Check out Pat's story in the video above and for more information on PatsyPie gluten-free baked goods, please visit the website at www.patsypie.com!