For a consequtive year, Bulgarian enterprises, as well as all those established in member states of the European Union (EU), as well as Ukraine, meeting the requirements for a small and medium-sized enterprise (SME) and seeking protection of their trademarks or industrial designs, have the opportunity to receive financial support through a partial reimbursement of the costs of the official fees paid by them up to EUR 1000.

The financial assistance is granted by the European Commission and the European Union Intellectual Property Office (EUIPO), in the form of vouchers, and covers the following services for the registration of trademarks and industrial designs:

• Reimbursement of 75% of the costs for official fees for registration of European Union Trademark and/or Community (EU) industrial designs, class surcharges, examination fees, registration fees, publication fees and deferred publication fees, but not more than 1000 EUR.
• Reimbursement of 75% of the costs for national or regional official fees for trademark and/or industrial design applications, e.g. Bulgarian trademark registration or Bulgarian industrial design registration, additional class/class fees, examination fees, registration fees , publication and postponing fees, but not more than EUR 1000.
• Reimbursement of 50% of the costs for the basic official fees for trademark and/or design applications, designation fees, as well as subsequent designations outside the EU, e.g. International trademark registration or International industrial design registration. EU country designation fees are included in the 2024 SME Fund scheme, but not more than EUR 1000. Handling fees charged by the office of origin are not included.

The application process is extremely simplified and after the review of the submitted documents by the EUIPO, within about 14-20 calendar days, the decision to award grant in the form of a voucher is received. Vouchers can only be used for the IP activities they cover and are non-transferable. The validity of the issued vouchers has an initial period of 2 months, which can be extended by another 2 months. When activating the voucher, i.e. when it is used to reimburse already incurred expenses for government fees, its term is further extended by 6 months from the date of activation, during which period it can be used for additional IP services, but only for the IP activities for which it is allocated , and until reaching the limit of the treshold amount of 1000 euros.

The estimated budget for 2024 will be €18.85 million for IP scanning and trademark or design protection vouchers, and the grant application period is from 22/01/2024 to 06/12/2024.

If you need additional information and assistance when applying for the SME funding program 2024 for the registration of trademarks and designs in Bulgaria or the European Union, please do not hesitate to contact us – patent and trademark office K TAHTADJIEV, and it will be our privilege to assist you in this regard.