– Filing and prosecution of national and international design applications
– Filing oppositions against design applications
– Submitting counterview against oppositions
– Preparing and filing design license agreements
– Undertaking renewals of registered designs
– Preparing and filing design assignment agreements
– Recordal of name/address change
– Translation services
– Translation services
– Representing Clients before government agencies relating to design transactions
– Legal services

Requests relating to design registration proceedings are made to the Turkish Patent and Trademark Office (TurkPatent). TurkPatent enforces the Industrial Property Code numbered 6769 and adopts Locarno Classification. Multiple design applications under the same class with max. 100 reproductions can be requested.

Turkey is a member of the WIPO, Hague Agreement, Paris Convention, and WTO. Claiming priority under Paris Convention, and filing international registration under the Hague Agreement is possible.

Clients who are domiciled outside the borders of the Republic of Turkey – except for those making an application through the Hague – can only be represented by trademark attorneys who are authorized to act before TurkPatent.

1. Name and address of the applicant
2. Name of the designer
3. Confidentiality demand for the designer(s) name(s) (optional)
4. Name of the product in which the design is incorporated or to which it is applied
5. Reproductions in JPEG format (min. 8×8, max. 16×16)
6. Description of the design (optional)
7. Deferment demand (optional / up to 30 months)
8. Information about priority (date, number, country of origin), if any
9. Priority document with its sworn translation in Turkish (can be filed later), if any

TurkPatent carries out the following steps for registration:

1. procedural and novelty examination (1-6 months)
2. publication of the registration decision (3 months)
3. examination of oppositions and appeals
4. granting registration (2 months)

TurkPatent examines the design application in terms of formal, substantive, and novelty criteria. The novelty examination is conducted through online search tools to determine whether the design is presented to the public in any part of the world or not. If the design differs only in minor details, it shall be accepted as identical and the application is refused.

The design fulfilling the criteria is published in the Bulletin. The applicant along with the application may request the postponing of the publication for a period of thirty-month starting from the application date or, if any, the priority date.

If no opposition is filed by third parties or the opposition of a third party is rejected by the Department of Re-examination and Evaluation, the registration certificate of the design is issued.

The protection term of a registered design covers a period of five-year as from the date of filing. This period may be prolonged in total up to twenty-five years by means of renewing in five-year periods.

Request for renewal needs to be made by the design proprietor within six months before the expiry of the protection date. In case no request is made to the TurkPatent within this period, a renewal request may be made within six months after the expiry of the protection date, provided that an additional fee is paid.

The designs are protected as registered designs or unregistered designs.

If the design is registered in accordance with the provisions of the IP Code, it will be protected as a registered design. The protection term of a registered design is 5 years from the date of filing. This period may be prolonged in total up to 25 years by means of renewing in five-year periods.

If the design is made available to the public for the first time in Turkey, it is protected as an unregistered design. The protection period for unregistered designs is 3 years from the date on which the design is first made available to the public.