Nigeria: Trademark

Welcome to the third edition of our 2025 Intellectual Property Newsletter.

Revocation of trademarks refers to the legal process of cancelling or removing a registered trademark from the official Trademark Register by the Registrar of Trademarks or the court.

On 20th March 2025, Honourable Justice Daniel Osiagor of the Federal High Court, Lagos ordered MTN Nigeria Communications Limited to pay ₦840,000,000.00 in damages to Citilink Accesscorp Limited for infringing on its registered trademark, "WEBPLUS."

Intellectual property (IP) assets such as trademarks, copyrights, or patents form a critical part of a company's overall assets. Categorized as intangible assets, IP assets play a key role in defining a business' competitive advantage, brand value and investment value amongst others.

For most tech startups, the real asset is not a sleek office or shiny gadgets; it is intellectual property (IP). Your code, brand, and ideas are the foundation of value. But if you don't secure ownership, that foundation can collapse overnight.

In our last Newsletter, we highlighted how licensing external tech can help you grow without losing focus on your core business objective. Now, let's flip the script, what if your IP could do the heavy lifting?

Trademarks are important identifiers made up of words or design components that represent the origin, ownership, and development of products or services.

A trademark is a distinctive mark or sign that distinguishes a person's products from the products of others in the market. A trademark may be one or a combination of words, letters or numbers.

While the role of technology transfer in the economic development of Nigeria cannot be downplayed, it is worthy to note that technology transfers in Nigeria can be better maximized with emergence of Nigerian brands pursuant to such transfers rather than merely serving as extensions or local branches for foreign brands.