Glossary
French: marque française
A French trademark is a trademark filed with the INPI, France’s national industrial property office. Filing is done online on the INPI’s website — in practice, through a French trademark attorney (see French trademark registration).
The French mark is valid throughout the entire French territory, including the overseas departments and territories — a scope US counsel sometimes underestimates, since it reaches markets in the Caribbean, the Indian Ocean and the Pacific. One exception: the French mark no longer covers French Polynesia automatically; an additional fee of €60 is required to extend a French mark there.
The single biggest practical difference for a US filer is what the INPI does not check. Unlike the USPTO, the INPI does not require proof of use before registration, does not conduct a substantive likelihood-of-confusion search against the register, and will not refuse an application merely because a similar earlier mark exists. Prior rights are enforced only if their owner actively files an opposition or, later, a trademark cancellation action — the burden sits entirely on rights holders to police the register, not on the INPI to screen incoming applications. This is why a trademark clearance search before filing matters even more in France than it does in the US: registration alone is not proof the mark is safe to use.
A French trademark is the rough functional equivalent of a US federal registration issued by the USPTO under the Lanham Act, but the examination model diverges sharply. USPTO examination screens for descriptiveness and for conflicting prior marks, and generally requires a use-in-commerce basis (or an intent-to-use filing later perfected by use) before registration issues. The INPI examines only absolute grounds — distinctive character, descriptiveness, deceptiveness, and similar public-order objections — and registers marks without any use requirement, a first-to-file system in the purest sense. A US applicant filing directly in France should not assume the resulting French certificate has been vetted against the same competitive landscape a US registration has.
A US company that has already registered its brand with the USPTO decides to expand into France and files a French trademark application through the INPI, without first running a clearance search. The INPI examiner checks only that the mark is not descriptive or deceptive and grants registration in about five months — but a French company holding an earlier, confusingly similar mark in the same class later opposes or sues, something a USPTO-style substantive search would likely have flagged before filing.
The French trademark is the natural starting point for a French filing strategy — see trademark opposition — INPI for what happens once the BOPI publication triggers the opposition clock. Once granted, the registration certificate anchors the mark, which can then support a priority claim, an international trademark, or seniority for a later European Union trademark.