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Wednesday Jul 18, 2012

USPTO and INTA Roundtable Discussions with Stakeholders

Guest blog by USPTO Commissioner for Trademarks Deborah Cohn

The USPTO has been co-hosting roundtable discussions with the International Trademark Association (INTA) since January. The purpose of these roundtable discussions is to bring together USPTO officials with trademark professionals from around the country so we can interact on current topics of interest to practitioners.

In addition to receiving updates on trademark initiatives and processes, attendees share practice tips and raise problems and issues that they have encountered. The roundtables have allowed us to receive input on a variety of developing issues in the trademark operation, and reactions to the sessions have been extremely positive.

To date, roundtables have been held in New York, Alexandria, Va., Wilmington, Del., Boston, and Raleigh, N.C. The next cities we will be visiting are Chicago (July 23), Seattle (Sept. 27), and Charlotte, N.C. (Oct. 14). We are also planning to schedule a session at our new Detroit office. We hope to connect with additional areas of the country in FY 2013.

As Commissioner for Trademarks, I have made it a priority to not just receive feedback from users, but also to seek it out. By going directly to our stakeholders, instead of just waiting for them to come to us, we can be sure the user community is heard.

We welcome any feedback you have on our user outreach. Is there an area of the country you might suggest for a roundtable? We have a dedicated mailbox for your comments (TMFeedback@uspto.gov) and we look forward to hearing from you.

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