Licensing
As with any business, its nature and products/services sold will entail specific licenses to operate.
With Ingwer Consulting, we help to advise our clients on the licenses most relevant to their needs, handle these licensing applications, and more.
Business License Applications
Compliance is a critical part of setting up your business anywhere. This may include applying for the right licenses and permits required to conduct business in your industry of choice.
The different types of licences include:
Compulsory Licenses
Certain businesses require unique, specific licenses before they are allowed to commence operations - the lack of which presents an offence to operate your business.
For example, childcare centres require a child care center license.
Occupational Licenses
For a company to offer professional services, occupational licenses will be required for all said professionals. This includes doctors, lawyers, architects, and accountants who normally obtain their licenses from their respective professional organizations.
Business Activity
Directed at the specific business activities, some require a license or permit to operate.
For example, the import or export of goods for sale requires a Customs Account with Singapore Customs, or the sale of liquor mandates a liquor license.
Trade mark registration
Although it is not legally compulsory to register a trademark, it adds significant value to a business. Filing your trademark registration allows you, as the owner, to obtain a right to ownership and the right to prevent others from using a similar mark without your permission.
Key features of Singapore’s Trade Marks Act include:
Trade mark registration under this act is only effective in Singapore. To obtain trade mark rights and protection in other countries, it is necessary to register the trade mark in those countries separately or pursue international trademark registration through the Madrid Protocol. As Singapore is a contracting country under the Madrid Protocol, an international application may be filed through IPOS in Singapore after the trademark has been successfully registered here. (For more details, see Worldwide Trade mark Registration through Singapore Trade Mark Office.)
A Singapore-registered trade mark must be capable of being represented graphically. This sign can be any letter, word, name, signature, numeral, device, brand, heading, label, ticket, shape, colour, and aspect of packaging or a combination of these. Unlike jurisdictions like the United States, the Singapore trademarks regime does not require evidence of use to be filed before a trade mark registration is granted.
There is no time limit for filing according to the Trade Marks Act. However it should be noted that a suit for an infringement of a registered trade mark is only possible if the trade mark is registered. A trade mark registration takes effect from the date of filing. The validity period of a registered trade mark in Singapore is 10 years, and can be renewed indefinitely at the end of each 10-year period.
With the introduction of service mark registration, the classes have been extended from International Classification 35 to 45. As a result of the inclusion of service marks, the search for prior rights will now extend to cover: with respect to trade marks applied on goods, those services which are closely related to the goods for which registration is sought, and, with respect to service marks, the examination will include marks for goods which are closely related to those services.