Impact of New Minimum Capital Amounts on Trade Registry Applications
With the Presidential Decree No. 7887 published in the Official Gazette dated November 25, 2023 and numbered 32380, the minimum capital amounts for joint stock and limited liability companies have been increased and accordingly, effective from January 1, 2024, the new minimum capital amounts have been determined as TRY 50,000 for limited liability companies, TRY 250,000 for joint stock companies and TRY 500,000 for joint stock companies that have adopted the registered… »
Processing of Personal Data without Consent as Expressly Stipulated by Laws
On February 12, 2024, the Personal Data Protection Authority ("Authority") published an Information Note on the Personal Data Processing Based on the Legal Reason Applicable to Processing Required for the Laws ("Information Note") and made assessments under Turkish law and EU law regarding the processing of personal data in cases stipulated by laws. Although the Information Note mostly includes general scholar explanations from Turkish law and EU law perspectives, we would… »
Agency Opinion on Health Claims in Food and Food Supplements Can Now Be Requested
The Regulation on the Use of Health Claims for Food and Food Supplements (“Regulation”) entered into force as of its publication on the Official Gazette dated 20 April 2023, and numbered 32169; and the requirement for obtaining approval from the Turkish Medicines and Medical Devices Agency ("Agency") under the Ministry of Health for the use of health claims in the labelling, promotion or advertisement of food supplements was abolished. Following this development, the Agency… »
Thoughts On 2023 Corruption Perception Index
Transparency International released the 2023 Corruption Perception Index (“2023 CPI”) on January 30, 2024. Widely regarded as the key reference point in this field, the annual CPI aims to measure the corruption perceptions in the public sector over various sources such as the World Bank, World Economic Forum, private risk and consulting firms and think-tanks. In the recent years, the Russian-Ukrainian war, the conflict growing violent between Israel and Hamas in Palestine… »
Freedom of Quotation in Cinema Works
With respect to lawsuits filed in the scope of Law No. 5846 on Intellectual and Artistic Works (“FSEK") No. 5846, an important standard in terms of plagiarism is the limits of freedom of quotation. According to Article 35 of the FSEK, in order to make a quotation from a work, it is necessary to; (i) incorporate some sentences and paragraphs of a work made public, into another work of science and literature, (ii) incorporate certain elements of a published composition, at the… »
Advertisement Board Issued New Principles for Preventing Misleading Loyalty Programs
The Advertisement Board ("Board") amended the "Guideline on Advertisements Containing Price Information, Discount Sale Advertisements and Commercial Practices" ("Guideline") in its meeting dated 09.01.2024 and numbered 341, introduced new principles for loyalty programs. Loyalty programs are generally defined as practices that allow consumers to collect points towards future purchases. The Board has observed that loyalty programs have recently turned into a discount sales… »
What Copyright and Trademark Owners Should Know About the Approach to NFTs in the Republic of Türkiye
Non-fungible tokens (NFTs) have grown in popularity since first entering public consciousness in 2021. They are digital tokens and may represent unique—virtual or real-world—items including songs, artworks, GIFs, virtual game items, videos, and cartoons. NFTs are created using blockchain technology and primarily operate within Ethereum, a blockchain platform with automated (smart) transactions. NTFs cannot be exchanged or replaced. The NFT is technically not the asset… »
Allocation of Domain Names in Structure of “a.tr”
In addition to domain names such as "com.tr" and "org.tr", which are already being allocated in Türkiye, allocation of domain names in the structure of "a.tr" has also become possible as of September 14, 2023. Domain names in the structure of “a.tr” do not include extensions such as ".com", ".net", ".org", etc. but have a direct country code extension of ".tr". Domain names in the structure of "a.tr", which have their legal basis in Provisional Article 3 of the Regulation on… »
FILA v EILO: Re-examination and Evaluation Board Carries out Global Appreciation of Visual Aspects of Conflicting Marks
FILA Luxemburg SARL opposed the registration of the figurative mark EILO based on the earlier well-known FILA marks While the Trademarks Department rejected the opposition, the Re-examination and Evaluation Board decided in the opponent’s favour The board notably concluded that the application was similar to the FILA marks in its overall appearance The Re-examination and Evaluation Board of the Turkish Patent and Trademark Office has recently rejected a trademark… »
Global Patent Litigation 2023, Turkey Chapter
Özge Atılgan Karakulak, Selin Sinem Erciyas and Zeynep Çağla Üstün have contributed to 2023 edition of Global Patent Litigation: Strategy & Practice - Turkey Chapter, which is published by Wolters Kluwer. “Global Patent Litigation: Strategy & Practice” is a resource that provides reliable descriptions of the patent laws for key countries along with insights into successful strategies to avoid, defend, or pursue litigation in each jurisdiction. Every chapter is updated… »
Guideline on The Processing of T.R. Identity Numbers Published By The Personal Data Protection Authority
Within the scope of the Law No. 6698 on the Protection of Personal Data ("Law"), the Turkish Republic Identity Number ("T.R. ID Number") information of individuals is not included in the category of sensitive personal data, but rather is evaluated within the scope of identity data in the general category of personal data. However, in practice, the direct processing of the T.R. Identity Number data while the same data processing purpose could be achieved by processing… »
Changes to Minimum Wage, Severance Payments and Administrative Fines in 2024
At the beginning of each year, the minimum wage, severance payments and administrative fines prescribed by the Labour Act are revised. This article provides an overview of the 2024 changes, which came into effect on 1 January 2024. Minimum wage In 2023 the monthly minimum wage rate was 10.008.00 Turkish liras (gross), which was increased to 13,414.50 Turkish liras (gross) as of 1 July 2023. As of 1 January 2024, this has increased to 20.002.50 Turkish liras (gross). In this… »