Rouse Africa Visits OAPI.

Representatives of Rouse Africa, Maura Canavan and Claire Brown visited the OAPI headquarters

office in Yaounde, Cameroon last month.

They were hosted by Maurice Batanga, Director of Legal Affairs and received a very warm welcome from all the OAPI staff they met. They were given a full tour of the new OAPI offices and received an insight into the day to day workings of OAPI.

OAPI's accession to the Madrid system for the international registration of trade marks was an important talking point on the agenda and it was interesting to hear that international applications designating OAPI currently made up nearly a third of the total applications they received in the past year! Given that the Madrid Protocol entered into force in March 2015 this is a significant development.

As with anything new, changes are being implemented to accommodate the handling of the international designations coming in and OAPI is working closely with WIPO in that regard. The Bangui Agreement (the agreement establishing OAPI) is also in the process of amendment.

All in all, the visit to the OAPI Registry was a successful one.

For more information on OAPI, see our blog posts here and here or kindly contact Rouse Africa