Consolidated text 07/VBHN-VPQH of the Law on Intellectual Property

CONSOLIDATED TEXT - THE OFFICE OF THE NATIONAL ASSEMBLY

LAW ON INTELLECTUAL PROPERTY^[1]

Law No. 50/2005/QH11 on Intellectual Property of November 29, 2005, of the National Assembly, which takes effect on July 01, 2006, is amended and supplemented by:

Law No. 36/2009/QH12 of June 19, 2009, of the National Assembly, Amending and Supplementing a Number of Articles of the Law on Intellectual Property, which takes effect on January 01, 2010.

Pursuant to the 1992 Constitution of the Socialist Republic of Vietnam, which was amended and supplemented under Resolution No. 51/2001/QH10 of December 25, 2001, of the X^th National Assembly at its 10^th session;

This Law prescribes the intellectual property^[2].

Chapter I

GENERAL PROVISIONS

Article 1. Scope of regulation

This Law regulates copyright, copyright-related rights, industrial property rights, rights to plant varieties and the protection of these rights.

Article 2. Subjects of application

This Law applies to Vietnamese organizations and individuals; foreign organizations and individuals that satisfy the conditions specified in this Law and treaties to which the Socialist Republic of Vietnam is a contracting party.

Article 3. Subject matters of intellectual property rights^[3]

1. Subject matters of copyright include literary, artistic and scientific works; subject matters of copyright-related rights include performances, phonograms, video recordings, broadcasts and encrypted program-carrying satellite signals.

2. Subject matters of industrial property rights include inventions, industrial designs, layout-designs of semiconductor integrated circuits, trade secrets, marks, trade names and geographical indications.

3. Subject matters of rights to plant varieties include reproductive and harvested materials.

Article 4. Interpretation of terms^[4]

In this Law, the terms below are construed as follows:

1. Intellectual property rights means rights of organizations and individuals to intellectual assets, including copyright and copyright-related rights, industrial property rights and rights to plant varieties.

 2. Copyright means rights of organizations and individuals to works they have created or own.

3. Copyright-related rights (below referred to as related rights) means rights of organizations and individuals to performances, phonograms, video recordings, broadcasts and encrypted program-carrying satellite signals.

4. Industrial property rights means rights of organizations and individuals to inventions, industrial designs, layout-designs of semiconductor integrated circuits, trade secrets, marks, trade names, geographical indications and trade secrets they have created or own, and the right to repression of unfair competition.

5. Rights to plant varieties means rights of organizations and individuals to new plant varieties they have selected, created or discovered and developed, or own.

6. Intellectual property right holder means an owner of intellectual property rights or an organization or individual that is assigned intellectual property rights by the owner.

7. Work means a creation of the mind in the literary, artistic or scientific domain, whatever may be the mode or form of its expression.

8. Derivative work means a work which is translated from one language into another, adapted, modified, transformed, compiled, annotated or selected.

9. Published work, phonogram or video recording means a work, phonogram or video recording which has been made available in a reasonable quantity of copies to the public with the permission of the copyright holder or related right holder.

10. Reproduction means the making of one or many copies of a work or a phonogram or video recording by whatever mode or in whatever form, including the backup of the work in electronic form.

11. Broadcasting means the transmission of the sound or image or both of a work, a performance, a phonogram, a video recording or a broadcast to the public by wire or wireless means, including satellite transmission, in such a way that members of the public may access that work from a place and at a time they themselves select.

12. Invention means a technical solution in the form of a product or a process which is intended to solve a problem by application of laws of nature.  

13. Industrial design means a specific appearance of a product embodied by three-dimensional configurations, lines, colors, or a combination of these elements.

14. Semiconductor integrated circuit means a product, in its final form or an intermediate form, in which the elements, at least one of which is an active element, and some or all of the interconnections, are integrally formed in or on a piece of semiconductor material and which is intended to perform an electronic function. Integrated circuit is synonymous to IC, chip and microelectronic circuit.

15. Layout-design of semiconductor integrated circuit (below referred to as layout-design) means a three-dimensional disposition of circuit elements and their interconnections in a semiconductor integrated circuit.

16. Mark means any sign used to distinguish goods or services of different organizations or individuals.

17. Collective mark means a mark used to distinguish goods or services of members from those of non-members of an organization which is the owner of such mark.

18. Certification mark means a mark which is authorized by its owner to be used by another organization or individual on the latter’s goods or services, for the purpose of certifying the origin, raw materials, materials, mode of manufacture of goods or manner of provision of services, quality, accuracy, safety or other characteristics of goods or services bearing the mark.

19. Integrated mark means identical or similar marks registered by the same entity and intended for use on products or services which are of the same type or similar types or interrelated.