New Report Explores the Problem of Trade Mark Clutter

A recent report co-authored for the UK Intellectual Property Office by Professor Christine Greenhalgh, provides insights into those aspects of trade mark law that can create so-called cluttering. This phenomenon, also explored in the "Study on the Overall Functioning of the European Trade Mark System" presented to the European Commission by the Max Planck Institute in February 2012, has caused some to suggest that -- if not addressed -- clutter will make clearing marks ever harder. This report both presents a conceptual discussion of "cluttering" of trade mark registers and offers an empirical analysis of the problem, looking at trade mark applications at the UK Intellectual Property Office (IPO) and the European trade mark office (OHIM). It concludes that, although firms could do more to avoid cluttering, there is no strong evidence that cluttering is a systemic problem in trade mark law comparable to that of patent thickets in patent law.