China's reform exposes your process.
Trademark published 3 January. Detected 2 February. Instructions received 4 March. Too late.
The revised PRC Trademark Law enters into force on 1 January 2027. For firms managing Chinese trademark portfolios from Europe, it shortens the opposition period from three months to two months, running from the date of preliminary publication.
The loss of thirty days removes the slack that has been quietly absorbing everything the workflow already does slowly: the watch reporting cycle, the translation, the email to the client, the client's internal process to reply, the second email, the budget approval. A ninety-day window for gave all of it. A sixty-day window does not.
The consequences fall mainly on the European side of the file, not the Chinese one. There are the two main practical consequences:
1. The instruction chain has to be compressed, and most of it is not yours. Client response time is the largest single block in the chain and the only one you do not control. It is also the block that does not shrink because a Chinese statute changed. Firms holding standing instructions and a pre-agreed opposition budget will file.
2. Madrid notifications now come to you. CNIPA notifications for international registrations designating China are only to the representative recorded with WIPO or on the holder directly, rather than to local Chinese agents. For Madrid filings made through your firm, responsibility for provisional refusals, oppositions and non-use cancellations on those files has effectively shifted to Europe, without anyone deciding that it should. Retain the envelope: the service date on it determines the deadline.
The supplementation window is unchanged for now. Under Article 27 of the 2014 Implementing Regulations, evidence may still be supplemented within three months of filing, which supports a file-first, evidence-second approach when a deadline is tight. It should not be hard-coded, however. Both the Implementing Regulations and the Examination and Review Guidelines are expected to be updated before 1 January 2027. Neither has appeared, and no transitional provision has been published for marks caught either side of the changeover. Advice given between now and year end should carry that caveat expressly.
Trademark Defender specialises in IP enforcement in China and acts as China-side counsel to International firms. We are glad to talk about the counterfeiting problems your clients are facing.
Contact us: Benjamin Dupuy d'Angeac or Bruno Grangier
Contact us
