New trademarks in Mozambican law

Abstract

In addition to traditional trademarks, those that are visually perceptible, new or non-traditional trademarks perceived by the sensory organs — sounds, smell, colour, taste, touch, letters and numbers, animated images, holograms and gestures — have proved fruitful. Since they emerged in the United States and Europe, their acceptance as true trademarks has not been settled either in doctrine or in case law. However, some successful cases of registration of this type of trademark are known thanks to painstaking jurisprudential work. Mozambique is a new country in trademark law. Although it has not so far received any application for the registration of a new trademark, the latest revision of the Industrial Property Code, by introducing the olfactory mark, has extended the possibility of registering this type of sign, a fact which shows that the country is attentive to these new realities in trademark matters. The present work therefore intends to provide a general overview, both doctrinal and jurisprudential, of the new trademarks, taking into account the European and North American experiences, and to present the situation of this type of mark in the Mozambican legal order.