Trademark

A legal protection for the names, logos, and slogans that identify your brand, preventing others from using confusingly similar marks in your market.

Why it matters

A trademark protects the brand you are investing in and stops copycats from trading on your name. Checking a name is available and registrable before you commit avoids a painful, expensive rebrand later.

For example

A startup trademarks its brand name and logo before launch, so a copycat cannot trade on the name it is about to spend money building.

Go deeper

Public Trademark Search, IP India IP India · tool The free, official first step before committing to a brand name: run a knockout search to see if the mark is already taken. Open ipindiaonline.gov.in →

Related terms

Also in Starting Up

See how founders actually handle this on Co-founders, team and legal, part of the Starting Up hub.

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