DERBY Case: Court of Appeal Overturns Lowercourt Decisions in Controversial Ruling
In opposition proceedings, the Court of Appeal has found that there was copyright infringement since the opponent’s logo had been copied in the mark applied for The well-known status of the earlier mark also served as a basis for the decision Arguably, the court correctly found that the applicant’s trademark should not be registered, but erred in its reasoning Background The owner of the DERBY trademark, registered and well known for razor blades, opposed an application for… »
Turkish Appeal Court Rules in Cow Trade Mark Case
In a case concerning trade mark and copyright law, the Turkish Court of Appeal has ruled that the use of a figure intensively cannot prevent the use of similar figures, as long as they are not identical. Background A recent decision of the Court of Appeal concerned an application to register a trade mark (shown right) in classes 29 and 43. The word elements in this application can be considered of low distinctiveness: ET means “meat” in Turkish, and so is descriptive for… »
Unfair Approach of Turkish IP Courts while Assessing “Bolar Exemption”
The article 85(3) (c) of the Industrial Property Law, which excludes the marketing authorization application from the scope of the patent right, is interpreted by the IP courts against the patent holder in a disproportionate way. The exemption here is the procedures that generic companies required to perform before the Ministry of Health in order to obtain a marketing authorization. Thus, for example, it enables the generic pharmaceutical company that applied for marketing… »
Changes to Minimum Wage, Severance Payments and Administrative Fines in 2020
Minimum wage Severance payments Administrative fines At the beginning of each year, the minimum wage, severance payments and administrative fines prescribed by the Labour Act are revised. On 1 January 2020 the changes for 2020 came into effect. Minimum wage In 2019 the monthly minimum wage rate was TL2,558.40 (gross). As of 1 January 2020, this has increased to TL2,943.00 (gross). The new rate applies from 1 January 2020 to 31 December 2020. The minimum wage applies to all… »
Notes from the 2019 Corruption Perceptions Index for Turkey
On 23 January 2020, Transparency International announced the much-awaited results of the 2019 Corruption Perceptions Index (the “CPI 2019”), which reflects the perception of country experts, non-governmental organisations and representatives of the business world of corruption in public sector. The CPI 2019 scores 180 countries and territories on a scale from 0 (highly corrupt) to 100 (very clean). The results, unfortunately, did not come as too much of a surprise for Turkey… »
Supreme Court Revokes Its Decision on Service Date of Electronic Notifications
Introduction As of 1 January 2019, the scope of electronic notification was expanded to include several institutions, including all public institutions and organisations, lawyers, notaries, experts and mediators following amendments to the Notification Law (7201). The Post and Telegraph Organisation has been assigned the operation of electronic notification transactions through the National Electronic Notification System. Further, the Regulation on Notification via Electronic… »