Motion Trademarks as an Element of Brand Promotion
One of the most interesting forms of trademark in circulation is the motion trademark
A Moving Logo
A motion mark may be an animation created using a computer program, or some other moving object which exists in the real world. In particular, such a mark may be in the form of a gesture made by a person using various parts of the body, especially the hand. Submitting a motion trademark involves the same criteria of assessment as do other forms of trademarks, but motion marks remain but a small fraction of the trademark submissions made in the European Union.
A motion trademark should have distinctiveness, and should be possible to depict precisely in an application. The presentability of motion marks depends on being able to depict a series of movements by an appropriate arrangement of a sequence of images. It is also crucial to provide a sufficiently exact description of the mark, including the order and form of the movement occurring in the images. In a motion mark, it is precisely the motion and the succession of scenes which are the most important aspects which may be subject to protection. Care must also be taken, since motion marks cannot appear in trade in “pure” form, but only as a combination of marks, for example, movement and sound (e.g. application CTM No. 003429909 showing clasping hands, used for some time by the company Nokia).