During the Office for Harmonisation in the Internal Market (OHIM) Users Group Meeting last week, our friends at OHIM told us about two new tools which are in the pipeline.  

The first is a Community design registration (CDR) online filing tool. A new online form for filing CDR is being developed in order to adapt the software of the filing tool to the software of the rest of the OHIM website. OHIM's software architecture will thus be enhanced, with the much looked-forward-to result that failures connected with the uploading of multiple designs should no longer occur.

But this is not all! The new tool will come with two extras:

(a) Up to three extra views can be submitted, so-called "non-protected views". After uploading by simple drag-and-drop function or during examination, non-protected views may be exchanged with protected views, e.g. where clarity objections against the protective views are raised by the Office. Also, sometimes priority applications contain more than the maximum allowed seven views, and these can be submitted as non-protected views (only up to three). At present, it is still only possible to submit JPEG files (of unlimited size in future). During the presentation of the new filing tool, members of the Users Group urged OHIM also to allow submission of files in PDF, TIF and PNG format.

(b) In addition, 3D files of the type OBJ, XTL and X3D can be submitted as object files. However, they are limited to black and white, even if submitted in colour. The new tool automatically creates the seven typical views from the 3D object. Alternatively, the applicant may make individual screen shots from seven selected views of the 3D object. Better still, automatically provided views can be replaced with individual screen shots when completing the form. The 3D model will be accessible for third parties in e-search.

The second new tool is a Goods and Services Builder for users of the Community trade mark system, which you can read about here on our sister weblog, the Class 46 European trade mark blog.