Choosing a name for your enterprise may seem simple, yet it is a crucial step: you need to find the ideal name that attracts customers and sets you apart from your competitors.
Moreover, you need to comply with various specific provisions depending on whether you start your enterprise as a sole proprietorship or a company.
In some cases, sole proprietors might choose to run their enterprise under their own name.
The name of your enterprise also determines the trademark of the goods and services you sell, your website domain, email address, packaging of your products, etc.
Before choosing a trade or company name for your enterprise, you may want to check whether there is a comparable or similar earlier trademark for similar activities and territories. You can carry out a search via the website of the Benelux Office for Intellectual Property (BOIP), which manages the Benelux trademark register. This register provides access to trademarks that are protected on the Benelux territory.
There are different options for choosing and protecting your trade and company name, depending on the type of legal structure:
Choose a trade and/or company name (Sole prioprietors may only need a trade name)
- Keep in mind possible negative or controversial connotations of the name of your enterprise before making any final decision. it is advised to check its meaning in other languages, especially if you are going to sell your goods and services outside of Belgium.
- Search in the Crossroads Bank for Enterprises for existing enterprises to check whether a name already exists.
Protect your trade name
- The right to a trade name requires no prior filing or registration formalities. The right arises from the first public use made of the trade name.
- Publishing the trade name in the Crossroads Bank for Enterprises might constitute this first use, but in the event of a dispute, proof will have to be provided, meaning that the rules of the Civil Code will apply.
Protect your company name
- The right to the company name of a legal entity is acquired upon registration at the Enterprise Court, since the company acquires legal personality on that date.
Trademark
- While the trade name and company name are distinctive signs of the company itself, the trademark is the distinctive sign of the goods or services of the company.
- In order to be protected, the trademark must be diligently registered according to a procedure. The Benelux Office for Intellectual Property (BOIP) can provide you with all the information you need on this subject.