Current through Register Vol. 18, September 20, 2024
(1) The Secretary
of State's role with regard to the registration of business/mark names is
ministerial. If a business/mark name is distinguishable from another
business/mark name, the Secretary of State is required to file it.
(2) Pursuant to Title 30, chapter 13, MCA,
and Title 35, chapters 1, 2, 4, 7, 8, 10, 12, and 18, MCA, "distinguish,"
"distinguishable," "distinguishable on the record," and "distinguishable in the
records" means that a registered business/mark name must be sufficiently
distinctive from another registered business/mark name so that it does not
cause confusion in an absolute or linguistic sense.
(3) The following items make a registered
business/mark name distinguishable from another registered business/mark name:
(a) key words are different and do not copy a
business/mark name already on record. A "key word" means any word other than
articles, prepositions, conjunctions, or business name identifiers as defined
in 30-13-201, MCA. For example:
"Bill's Carpentry" is distinguishable from "Bill's Builders."
(b) key words are the same, but are in a
different order. For example: "Yellowstone Hotel" is distinguishable from
"Hotel Yellowstone."
(c) the use of
geographic designations. For example: "Helena Auto Painting" is distinguishable
from "Boulder Auto Painting."
(d)
phonetic similarities. For example: "Maid in Montana" is distinguishable from
"Made in Montana."
(e)
abbreviations. For example: "Montana Ave Salon" is distinguishable from
"Montana Avenue Salon."
(f)
different spellings of proper names. For example: "Jayne's Boutique" is
distinguishable from "Jane's Boutique."
(g) unique or improper spelling. For example:
"Black Cat Designs" is distinguishable from "Black Kat Designs."
(4) The following conditions will
not make a registered business/mark name distinguishable from another
registered business/mark name:
(a) the use of
punctuation marks . For example: "R/D Construction" and "R D Construction" are
not distinguishable.
(b) the use of
special characters. Special characters are non-alphabetical and non-numeric
characters such as @, #, $, %, &, *, and + that can represent a word. For
example: 25 % Better, Inc. and 25 Percent Better, Inc. are not
distinguishable.
(c) the use of
articles "a," "an," or "the." For example: "The Painted Pony" and "Painted
Pony" are not distinguishable.
(d)
the use of business name identifiers or their abbreviations. For example: "ABC
Inc.," ''ABC Co.," and "ABC Corp." are not distinguishable.
(e) the substitution of an arabic or roman
numeral for a spelled-out number. For example: " 3 Kings," "III Kings," and
"Three Kings," are not distinguishable.
(f) the substitution of a lower case letter
for a capital letter. For example: "d" and "D" are not
distinguishable.
(g) the use of
internet domain suffixes. For example: ".com," ".org," ".gov," and ".net" are
not distinguishable.
(h)
contractions. For example: "Do Not Stop, Inc." is not distinguishable from
"Don't Stop, Inc."
(i) variations
in word endings. For example: "Betsy's Cleaners" is not distinguishable from
"Betsy's Cleaning" and "ABC Transport, Inc." is not distinguishable from "ABC
Transportation, Co."
(j) adding the
letter "s" to make a word, including an alphabetism, plural or possessive. For
example: "Jay's Market" and "Jays Market" and "RM's Co." and "RMS Co." are not
distinguishable.
(k) different
spacing. For example: "Cross Roads Ranch" and "Crossroads Ranch" are not
distinguishable.
(5) The
Secretary of State reserves the right to not register business names that are
vulgar or grossly offensive.
AUTH: Ch. 166, Sec. 1, L. 2015,
35-1-1307,
35-1-1315,
35-2-1107, MCA; IMP:
30-13-202,
30-13-310,
35-1-308,
35-1-310,
35-1-311,
35-1-1031,
35-2-305,
35-2-307,
35-2-826,
35-4-206,
35-7-106, ,
35-8-103,
35-8-108,
35-10-703,
35-12-505,
35-18-201,
MCA
