The Madrid System: One Trademark, Many Countries

The Madrid System lets a trademark owner file once, through their own national office, and ask WIPO to extend that mark to chosen member countries. Each country still decides for itself. Nepal is not a member, so a brand here needs a direct filing at the Department of Industry (DoI).

Key takeaways

• Madrid is a filing and admin system, not a worldwide trademark. Every designated office applies its own law.
• You need a basic mark at an office of origin, and a link to that country through nationality, domicile or a real establishment.
• A designated office must normally refuse within 12 months, or 18 where it has declared the longer period.
• For five years the international registration depends on the basic mark. Losing the basic mark can bring the whole thing down.
• An international registration runs 10 years and renews in 10-year periods from one place.
• Nepal is not a contracting party, so protection here comes from the DoI under the Patent, Design and Trademark Act 1965.

What is the Madrid System for international trademark registration?

It is WIPO's central route for filing and managing one trademark across several countries. You file a single international application and name the members you want it to reach.

WIPO records the mark in the International Register and passes it to each named office. The Protocol says the mark is then treated in each place as if it had been filed there directly.

That last point is the one people miss. Madrid moves the paperwork, not the decision, and it reaches only the members you named.

Who can file, and through which office?

Article 2 of the Protocol sets the entry test. You need a basic application or registration at an office, plus a link to that country through nationality, domicile or a real and effective industrial or commercial establishment.

That office becomes your office of origin, and the international application must go through it. You cannot walk up to WIPO directly.

This is why a Nepali company cannot start a Madrid filing from home. Nepal has no office of origin in the system, as our note on Nepal's Madrid status sets out.

Why does the Madrid route need a basic mark?

The international registration is built on top of a national one. WIPO does not examine whether your mark is registrable — it checks the form and records it.

The substantive check has already happened, or is happening, at your home office. Every later designation borrows that starting point.

The cost of that shortcut is dependency, which is covered further down. It is the single most under-explained feature of the system.

What does designating a country actually do?

Article 4 says protection in each designated contracting party is the same as if the mark had been filed directly with that office. It puts your mark into that country's queue.

It does not skip the queue. The office examines, publishes and opposes under its own rules, on its own timetable.

A Paris Convention priority claim carries through the international application without extra formalities, which preserves an earlier filing date where one exists.

Can a designated office still refuse the mark, and by when?

Yes, and refusals are common. An office notifies a provisional refusal, and from that point you deal with that office, usually through a local representative.

Article 5(2) sets the clock: refusal must come within one year, unless the contracting party has declared the longer period of 18 months. Many have.

There is a carve-out for refusals based on an opposition, which can arrive after that window in some cases. A designation is not safe simply because the deadline has passed.

What is central attack?

For five years from the international registration date, the whole thing hangs on the basic mark. Article 6(2) makes it independent only after those five years.

If the basic application or registration is withdrawn, refused or cancelled inside that window, the international registration loses protection to the same extent. One challenge at home can undo protection in twenty countries.

Proceedings that merely start inside the five years count too, even if they finish later. This is the risk a single-country dispute quietly creates.

What is transformation, and when does it help?

Transformation is the escape hatch after a central attack. Article 9quinquies lets the holder file national applications in the places the cancelled registration had covered.

Those applications are treated as filed on the international registration's original date, so you keep your priority. The catch is the deadline: three months from the cancellation.

It rescues the date, not the money. You end up with the separate national filings the international registration was meant to avoid.

How long does an international registration last?

Article 7 gives it ten years, renewable for further ten-year periods on payment of the fees. The renewal is handled centrally rather than office by office.

That is a real administrative saving for a large portfolio. One date, one payment, one record to keep current.

Nepal's own term is shorter and separate: seven years from registration, renewable in seven-year terms under Sec. 18D and Sec. 23B of the 1965 Act.

Nepal also expects the mark to be used. Sec. 18C lets the DoI cancel a registration not put into use within one year, which has no equivalent in the Madrid rules.

Can you add countries to it later?

Yes. Article 3ter allows a subsequent designation, recorded by WIPO and effective from the date of recording. New markets can be added as the business grows.

A subsequent designation expires with the international registration it hangs off, so the dates stay aligned rather than drifting apart.

What it cannot do is add a non-member. Nepal is not on WIPO's list of contracting parties, so there is nothing there to designate.

Why does none of this reach Nepal?

Because Nepal never joined. WIPO's dated list of Madrid contracting parties, current to 8 July 2026, records 117 members and Nepal is not one of them.

Nepali law says the same thing from the other side. Sec. 21B of the Patent, Design and Trademark Act 1965 provides that a mark registered abroad is not valid in Nepal unless registered here.

You can confirm both yourself at WIPO and read the Act on the Nepal Law Commission site. Do not take a treaty position from an undated page.

Which classes does a foreign brand need in Nepal?

Nepal works with the Nice Classification: Classes 1 to 34 for goods and 35 to 45 for services. Sec. 18A requires a separate application for each class.

Pick classes from what you will sell in Nepal, not from what your home registration happens to cover. A distributor arrangement often narrows the list rather than widening it.

The class finder and the AI class suggester are quick ways to test a description before anything is filed.

How do you file directly at the DoI?

Through a Nepal-based agent holding a notarised power of attorney, in almost every foreign case. The steps below are the ordinary national route.

1. Search the register. Our free Nepal trademark search covers marks published in DoI bulletins, so it shows publication rather than registration status.
2. Check who is filing under your name. The owner and applicant search shows whether a distributor or competitor already has applications on record.
3. Fix the owner and the classes. Decide which entity should hold the mark, then list one application per class you actually need.
4. File with the DoI. The agent submits the form, the mark labels and the authority documents, and claims Paris priority if it still applies.
5. Answer examination. The DoI tests the mark against the Sec. 18 grounds and may raise objections needing a written reply.
6. Clear publication. Sec. 21A has the accepted mark published in the Industrial Property Bulletin, and anyone may oppose within 90 days.
7. Collect the certificate. With no successful opposition, title passes on registration under Sec. 16 and the term starts running.

What documents does a foreign applicant prepare?

A notarised power of attorney appointing the Nepali agent, the company authority showing who may sign, the mark labels, and a clear list of goods or services.

Sec. 17 of the Act requires four specimens of the mark with the application. A foreign owner also commonly supplies a certified copy of the home registration, with an English version where the original is in another language.

Requirements shift, so confirm the current list with the Department of Industry or your agent before assembling the file. Our guide to documents for a Nepal filing goes item by item.

How long does the Nepal route take?

An unopposed application usually takes about 12 to 14 months from filing to certificate, and the smoothest cases finish in 6 to 8 months. Treat that as typical, never as a promise.

Our own bulletin records put the median filing-to-publication gap at about 3.5 months, though about one mark in six waits more than two years. The stage that cannot be shortened is the 90-day opposition window.

Our guide to how long registration takes breaks each stage down further.

What does this look like for one brand?

Imagine a Dutch outdoor-gear company with an EU registration and an international registration designating twelve members. It signs a Kathmandu importer and expects the Nepal shelves to be covered. This is an illustration, not a real case.

They are not. The international registration never named Nepal, because it could not, and Sec. 21B keeps the EU registration out.

Worse, the importer may have filed the same name at the DoI in its own name. Nepal rewards the earlier valid application, so the brand owner is now the later applicant.

Where a conflicting mark has already been published, the 90-day window is the moment to act, and our opposition and enforcement team works inside it.

Common mistakes

• Reading "international" as "everywhere". An international registration covers the members you designated and nothing else.
• Ignoring the five-year dependency. A challenge to the basic mark at home can strip protection across every designation.
• Missing the three-month transformation deadline. After a central attack, that window is the only way to keep the original date.
• Letting the importer own the Nepali mark. Recovering a mark from a former partner is slower and costlier than filing it correctly once.
• Copying the home goods list into Nepal. File for what you will actually sell here, class by class.
• Assuming a passed refusal deadline means safety. An opposition-based refusal can still arrive in some contracting parties.

In short

The Madrid System is a strong administrative tool: one filing, one renewal date, one register for changes, and the option to add members as you grow.

It is not a global right. Each office decides for itself, the basic mark carries the whole structure for five years, and non-members are simply out of reach.

Nepal is one of those non-members, so plan a direct DoI filing alongside the international one. Our clearance search comes first, then trademark registration at the DoI, with renewal tracked from there.

People also search for

• Is Nepal a member of the Madrid System?
• How did the Madrid System begin?
• How do the international filing timelines compare?
• What are the options for Nepal instead?
• How do you register a trademark in Nepal?
• How does the Nice class system work?

If your brand already holds an international registration and Nepal is next on the list, the practical first step is checking what the DoI register already shows in your classes — contact our team and we will read it with you.