New IP official charges in Vietnam to take effect from 1 January 2017

The Ministry of Finance of Vietnam has issued a Circular (No. 263/2016/TT-BTC) stipulating the official fees to be collected by the National Office of Intellectual Property of Vietnam (NOIP) for industrial property-related activities which effected from 1 January 2017. These fees will apply to patent, utility solution, industrial design, trade mark, geographical indication and integrated circuit layout design applications received by the NOIP.

In general, while many of the fee items such as the basic filing, publication and granting fees are unchanged, some fees will be significantly increased. For example, the fee for substantive examination of each embodiment of an industrial design application is expected to increase by about 67%. Renewal fees for industrial design and trade mark registrations will also go up by about 30%. In totally, the official charges for industrial property-related activities in Vietnam has been increased nearly 40%.