China Trademark Bad Faith: The Ten Situations CNIPA Lists

A foreign brand owner files in a couple of classes, uses the mark on one product line, and thinks no further. Then a clearance search returns dozens of applications lodged in the same week by a company with no factory, no shop and no website, each a well-known name from a different industry. Or the mirror image: a distributor files the brand owner's mark across a run of classes, not to sell under it, but to hold the ground.

Both get called bad faith, and clients treat them as one problem. CNIPA's Trademark Office addressed the confusion in a question-and-answer paper published alongside the Trademark Examination and Review Guidelines, which contain a dedicated chapter on applications "not intended for use and filed in bad faith". The paper repays close reading: the boundary it draws is narrower than the label suggests, and the two patterns travel on different grounds.

Two patterns, judged by the interest they harm

The paper sorts bad-faith registration by what it damages. One cluster — free-riding on another's reputation, chasing a trending term, filing the name of a public figure — is built around harming or attaching to a particular party's goodwill, civil rights and lawful interests. The other cluster — filing in bulk, staking out resources — is built around disturbing the registration and management order itself.

The distinction decides which ground is used. Where the first pattern harms only a specific party's private interest and does not touch the public interest, it is handled under the relative grounds, through the earlier right holder's objection. It is not treated as an application not intended for use. Where the volume is large enough that the filings improperly occupy trademark resources and disrupt the order, both grounds are applied together.

The chapter's definition repays setting out in full. It describes an applicant that, rather than acting on the needs of its production and business operations, submits a large number of applications, lacks a genuine intent to use, improperly occupies trademark resources and disrupts the registration order. "Not intended for use" is described as filing with neither an actual purpose to use the mark nor any step taken towards using it, or where no realistic possibility of use can be inferred.

The test is not distinctiveness, and not who got there first: it is scale, intent and the effect on the register.

No use evidence is required — and the tolerance is bounded

China grants the exclusive right on registration, not on use. An applicant is not, as a general matter, asked to submit use evidence or a statement of intention with the application — foreign applicants often misread this in the other direction, when an ordinary filing programme sized to a real business needs no proof of anything.

The chapter nevertheless carves out two situations that fall outside the ground. The first is defensive filing — a registrant applying, on goods or services outside its main business, for marks identical or similar to its core brand, to prevent others from free-riding on or tarnishing the goodwill built there. The second is pre-positioning for a future business with realistic expectations: because the interval between planning and a product reaching market is long, a market participant may file a moderate number in advance to guard against pre-emptive filings or avoid infringing earlier rights.

Both are bounded: the paper says the recognition is limited, and that in either case the number must be appropriate. Filing beyond a reasonable and necessary limit — over-defensive or over-reserve filing without genuine intent to use — still occupies trademark and administrative resources, and can still be characterised as a bad-faith non-use filing even with no intention of selling the marks on.

A resale motive is not a precondition: portfolio size and class coverage are what get looked at.

The ten situations the chapter lists

The chapter sets out ten:

Applications so numerous that they clearly exceed the needs of normal business activity, without genuine intent to use, disrupting the registration order.
Mass reproduction, imitation or copying of marks belonging to several different parties that enjoy a degree of reputation or strong distinctiveness.
Repeated filing of a specific mark belonging to one party that enjoys a degree of reputation or strong distinctiveness.
Mass filing of signs identical or similar to others' trade names, abbreviated enterprise names, e-commerce store names, domain names, the names, packaging or get-up of influential goods, distinctive advertising slogans, or designs.
Mass filing of signs identical or similar to the names of well-known people, the titles of well-known works or characters, or others' well-known artworks that have acquired distinctiveness — public cultural resources, in the chapter's framing.
Mass filing of signs identical or similar to administrative division names, mountain and river names, scenic spot names or building names.
Mass filing, for the designated goods or services, of generic names, industry terms, or signs directly indicating quality, main raw materials, function, use, weight or quantity — signs lacking distinctiveness.
Filing in bulk and assigning in bulk, with the assignees scattered.
Conduct aimed at improper gain: selling marks in quantity, pressing a prior user or others into commercial cooperation, or demanding a high transfer fee, licence fee or infringement payment.
Any other filing that can be characterised as bad faith.

Two notes. "Huge" and "large" carry no figure; the paper says they are assessed in light of the applicant's circumstances and the marks applied for. And the situations are not watertight: where the third overlaps with another ground, that other ground is applied, and where any of the others also breaches another provision, both are applied together.

Why two of the ten mostly surface in opposition and review

The chapter says situations three and nine are mainly applied in opposition and review proceedings. The reasoning given is procedural rather than substantive. Both generally need to be judged against the evidence on file, while examination is an active, ex parte step taken on the application documents: there is no stage at which a party adduces evidence or the other side tests it. Opposition and review give the challenged applicant a full opportunity to answer.

"Mainly" is not "only". The paper is explicit that the two situations are not wholly excluded from examination, and that examiners may take account of leads found while examining a file.

For a brand owner the consequence is practical. An opposition built on bulk filing turns on what the applicant's portfolio and assignment history show — how many marks, across how many classes, registered when, transferred to whom — rather than on the strength of the opponent's own mark. That is a different evidence exercise from a likelihood-of-confusion case, and it is why portfolio material is assembled before the notice is drafted.

A further layer sits outside the Guidelines. The State Administration for Market Regulation's rules on trademark filing conduct, issued as Order No. 17, require a trademark agency that knows or ought to know a client's application is a bad-faith non-use filing to decline the mandate. In practice that surfaces at onboarding: an agency asked to file a large, unrelated slate for a newly incorporated client has reason to ask what the business does.

Frequently asked questions

Does an applicant have to prove use in order to file in China?

No. The exclusive right is acquired on registration, and an application generally does not require use evidence or a statement of intent. What the examination chapter addresses is not a missing proof of use but scale and intent taken together: applications so numerous, and so detached from any business need, that a genuine intent to use cannot be inferred.

Can defensive filings across several classes be treated as bad faith?

The chapter recognises defensive filing as legitimate where the marks are identical or similar to the core brand and are filed outside the main business to protect goodwill already built. The recognition is expressly limited by quantity: filing beyond a reasonable and necessary limit, without genuine intent to use, can be characterised as a bad-faith non-use filing even where there is no plan to sell the marks on.

Why is bulk filing usually raised in opposition rather than during examination?

Because two of the listed situations — repeated filing against one party's mark, and conduct aimed at improper gain — generally depend on evidence that has to be tested. Examination proceeds on the application documents alone, with no evidence-taking or cross-examination. Opposition and review let the other side answer.

What counts as a large number of applications?

The paper attaches no figure. "Huge" and "large" are assessed in light of the applicant's own circumstances and the marks applied for, which in practice means the size and nature of the business, the classes covered, and whether the filings correspond to anything the applicant actually does or has concrete plans to do.

Official sources

《商标审查审理指南》重点问题一问一答——不以使用为目的的恶意商标注册申请的审查审理 — China National Intellectual Property Administration, Trademark Office, 8 February 2022.
Announcement No. 462 on the Issuance of the Trademark Examination and Review Guidelines — China National Intellectual Property Administration, 22 November 2021.
Provisions on Regulating Trademark Application and Registration Conduct (State Administration for Market Regulation Order No. 17) — State Council Gazette, 11 October 2019.