Mongolia joined the World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO) in 1979 and has been a member since. The following are the key laws that are protecting Intellectual Properties here in Mongolia:
- Copyright Law
- Law of Mongolia on Trade Names and Trademarks (Trade Names and Trademarks Law)
- Patent Law
General Authority for State Registration also handles the registration of Intellectual Property rights and policy implementations are managed by Intellectual Property Office of Mongolia (IPOM).
Copyright
Mongolian law on copyright covers “any scientific, literary or artistic works involving creative activity of authors”, which also states that “all types of scientific and literary works, musical works whether with or without lyrics, works of fine art, architecture and sculptures, photographic works and works created by methods similar to photography”. It also clarifies that it does not protect official texts of law, their translations, “any news or information with facts and figures for the purpose of reporting the current events and results thereof” and “any ideas, methods, procedures, scientific discoveries and mathematical concepts”.
Copyright protection is valid from the registration of copyright to IPOM to 50 years till the death of the author and only with the permission from the author, reproduction, publication, distribution and modification can be done into derivative work and rental work.
Trademarks and trade names
In order to receive protection under Trade Names and Trademarks Law, trademarks and trade names have to be registered by IPOM. In general, as long as it does not contain offensive image, or share close similarities to national symbol or another protected image or trademark, trademark can be used. All trade names are to be registered in Cyrillic writing, but can be accompanied with Latin counterpart.
Registration of tradename requires a copy of state registration certificate for the legal entity, and upon acceptance, which then the trade name or trademark into the is registered into the State register by IPOM, archives the application form in the trademark and tradenames database and issues a certificate. These certificates are in effect for 10 years and can be extended by another 10 years near expiration.
Registration also requires 10 copies of graphical representation of the trademark, in addition to the application form to be submitted to the IPOM.
Patents
For a patent to be eligible, an “inventive step” must be present in the patent application, which is suppose to show the technological improvement over currently available variant and its industrial application. The protection is in effect from the date of issue by IPOM. Its valid period length may vary depending on patent type or the issued certificate.
