FRANCE Law and Practice Contributed by: Vanessa Bouchara, Adèle Maier and Louise Lacroix, Cabinet Bouchara
4.3 Term of Registration French trade marks, as well as EU trade marks, are initially registered for a period of ten years, and this registration can be indefinitely renewed for subsequent ten-year periods. Article R712-24 of the French Intellectual Prop - erty Code provides that French trade marks are renewable within the last six months of the ten- year period. More precisely, the renewal can be filed until the last day of the month of the trade mark filing. After this term, French trade marks can still be subject to a late renewal for an additional “grace period” of six months after the term, subject to payment of an additional fee. After this addition - al period lapses, the trade mark can no longer be renewed and will definitively expire if it has not been renewed in due time. 4.4 Application Requirements The application to register a trade mark can be filed online on the FTO’s website. Any natural or legal person can file an application in their name and the applicant will not need to prove their identity. The applicant must identify the type of trade mark and the type of sign it seeks to regis - ter, and provide elements allowing to delimit the scope of the protection. The requirement for graphic representation has been abandoned with the introduction of the PACTE Law in 2020, which considerably expanded the list of categories of signs that are eligible for trade mark protection. This list now includes word, figurative, shape, hologram, pattern, colour (single or combination), sound, motion, multimedia and position marks. Such categories are listed by Declaration 2019-157 of the FTO’s Director.
No proof of use or specimen of use is required to apply for a trade mark. The filing of a trade mark application requires the payment of a fee to the FTO to be admis - sible (the fee varies depending on the number of designated classes and on whether the trade mark is extended to French Polynesia). Since the application can designate multiple classes of goods and services, the more classes the appli - cation covers, the more expensive the applica - tion will be. 4.5 Use in Commerce Prior to Registration The French system does not require the appli - cant to use its mark in commerce before the registration. 4.6 Consideration of Prior Rights in Registration Unlike practices of some foreign offices, the FTO does not carry out an analysis of prior rights in its examination of an application for registration. It only considers the regularity of the filing of the application (formal requirements), and the dis - tinctiveness of the sign (Article L.711-2 of the French Intellectual Property Code). The FTO is becoming increasingly stricter on assessing dis - tinctiveness of the sign. However, third parties have the right to partici - pate by filing observations before the FTO within two months of the publication of the trade mark application. Such observations may particularly relate to the lack of distinctiveness of the trade mark application. The filing of observations does not open any adversarial proceeding, thus the trade mark applicant is not given the chance to respond.
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