SOUTH KOREA Law and Practice Contributed by: Dongju Kwon, Chulgun Lim, Sejung Lee and Yoon Sun Kim, Yoon & Yang LLC
designated goods for at least three consecutive years after registration. 4.6 Consideration of Prior Rights in Registration When examining a trade mark application, the examiner should investigate the existence of a prior registered trade mark. A trade mark that is identical/similar to another’s previously filed or registered one for identical/similar designated goods cannot be registered, and the examiner will reject the application. However, under the amended Trade Mark Act that came into effect on 1 May 2024, one can register a subsequent trade mark with the con - sent of the owner of the prior registered trade mark for similar goods. If any of the co-existing trade marks are subsequently used in bad faith, thereby causing misunderstanding or confusion amongst consumers, the registration may be revoked. 4.7 Revocation, Change, Amendment or Correction of an Application Trade mark applications can be withdrawn or abandoned, and there are procedures for amending and changing an application. Amendment refers to an applicant correcting procedural or substantive defects in the appli - cation voluntarily or upon KIPO’s order within the following scope without altering the essence of the initial application: • reducing the scope of designated goods; • correcting errors; • clarifying unclear entries; or • deleting non-essential parts of the trade mark.
Change refers to changing the type of right (eg, trade mark or collective mark) without changing the contents of the application. When an appli - cation is changed, the initial application is con - sidered withdrawn. 4.8 Dividing a Trade Mark Application An applicant can divide a trade mark application after filing, whereby the application is divided into two or more applications if the initial appli - cation was filed for at least two kinds of goods as designated goods – ie, a divisional application only entails a division of the designated goods. A new application should be filed stating the pur - pose of the division, and the initial application should be amended to remove the designated goods intended for division. 4.9 Incorrect Information in an Application An application with incorrect information can be amended. The examiner has the authority to amend the application ex officio when deciding to publish the application if there is clearly incor - rect information in the application (eg, duplicate entries). In such a case, the examiner must notify the applicant of such amendment. If the applicant cannot accept all or part of the amendment, they should submit an opinion to KIPO, whereby the correction is deemed not to have been made from the onset and KIPO’s deci - sion to publish the application is also deemed to have been revoked. 4.10 Refusal of Registration The grounds for KIPO refusing a trade mark reg - istration are as follows: • not meeting the legal definition of a trade mark;
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