The crisis, political tensions, financial and socio-economic problems... The situation in Europe did not improve much in 2012 and the end of the malaise is not yet in sight. Our businesses are suffering from the poor conditions and naturally, the Benelux Office for Intellectual Property (BOIP) is also affected.
Despite the difficult circumstances, the BOIP continued to improve the quality of its services for users (at legal, administrative and IT levels) as well as participation in international and Community-level collaboration projects.
The use of several of our services fell considerably in 2012, which of course put pressure on our income. Fortunately, this drop in income was partially compensated by a reduction in the number of unpaid trademark filings, thanks to our new online payment module.
We have many reasons to be proud of our performance of the past year. In addition to our usual core tasks, we realised various large-scale projects such as the Designs Register, the processing of filings in the Caribbean Netherlands or the successful
The Benelux Patent Platform, a project aimed at creating an online platform for patent management in the three Benelux countries, soon resulted in the conclusion of the tendering procedure and contract. The BOIP collaborates in this project, mainly through the coordination and supervision of the actions of the various participants.
At Community level we are still awaiting the legislative proposals from the European Commission. At the moment, we already know that these proposals will deviate from the recommendations made by the European Council, especially as regards the redistribution of some of the renewal fees among the national offices. The BOIP is of course following this development very closely, but is aware that it will mainly affect small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) in our Benelux countries.
The SMEs of the Benelux remain first priority for the BOIP. That is why - despite the difficult financial situation of the BOIP - we have not increased the fees for 2012, for the seventh consecutive year. All these developments did of course affect the figures: for the first time in ten years, and despite major efforts in the field of cost control, the BOIP suffered a loss in 2012.
Trademark law and the European trademark landscape are subject to considerable changes. This is evidenced by case law, and in particular by the rulings in the Onel and IP Translator cases. The strategy of the Office for Harmonisation in the Internal Market (OHIM) is also showing signs of this change, now that the first step towards a European Trademark and Design Network has been made. This network is intended to reflect the convergence of the
actions and interests of the various European offices and users. Finally, the European authorities also show influence from this change in that they are now emphasising harmonisation and institutionalising their collaboration. We hope that, in the important decisions to be made, all parties will be aware of the particular qualities of the Benelux and the interests of the many and highly diverse users.
Finally, we would like to bid farewell to our colleague Dick Verschure, Deputy Director General of General Affairs, as he unfortunately had to resign from his position at the BOIP due to illness. We say goodbye to him with pain in our hearts and we will miss the quality of his work, his commitment and kindness.
Edmond Simon
Director General