Chinese companies are filing even more EU trademarks than Spanish, French and UK companies, reveals our study.
China has a sticky reputation of providing cheap counterfeits. During the past ten years Chinese companies have started to innovate their own products, and during the last few years Chinese brands have reached Western markets.
EU trademarks filed by Chinese companies has increased tremendously. In 2017 only German and American companies filed more EU trademarks than Chinese companies.
(Source: European Union Intellectual Property Office)
“Chinese brands like Huawei, Lenovo and Alibaba have led the way for other Chinese companies to go Western markets with their own brands” says trademark attorney and founder of Reggster.com, Erkki Holmila. Although China has been a lot in the limelight for producing counterfeits, at the moment their are protecting their brands in the EU more than for example French or the British.
“This statistics would be even more striking if it took into account those Western brands that are now owned by Chinese companies, like Volvo and Motorola”, says Holmila.
Chinese brands are still often plagued by poor image, but if this trend continues (and we believe it will), it is inevitable that European department stores will soon be flooded with Chinese brands.
(Source: European Union Intellectual Property Office)
