OpenAI
, the company behind ChatGPT, has been
denied
the
trademark
for “ChatGPT” and “GPT'' by the United States Patent and Trademark Office (
USPTO
). The company has the option to take this matter to the Trademark Trial and Appeal Board in three months. However, if the decision goes against them, it will prevent them from using these terms exclusively, allowing others to use them for their service or app.
UPSTO has rejected the trademark saying it's “merely descriptive”
According to a report by a website Tech Startups, the UPSTO has denied OpenAI’s application for
GPT
and ChatGPT because of the application not meeting the necessary requirements.
Also, the patent office has mentioned in the final refusal to register the “GPT'' trademark that it’s “merely descriptive”.
Apart from this, USPTO has mentioned in the rejection document that “The attached internet evidence illustrates that "CHAT" refers to "a synchronous exchange of remarks over a computer network." Moreover, the evidence establishes that "GPT" is a widely used acronym signifying "generative pre-trained transformers," which are neural network models providing applications with the ability to create human-like text and content (images, music, and more), and answer questions in a conversational manner.”
Not the first trademark rejection for Open AI
Open AI originally filed for the “GPT'' trademark in March 2021. However, it was rejected in May 2022 due to procedural error. Then, the company resubmitted the application with necessary payment and it also got rejected by UPSTO in September 2022.
Open AI then claimed that GPT has managed to gain a distinct identity due the widespread adaptation and also provided necessary documentation to support it.
Open AI still has the option to take the matter further, as mentioned above. Even if the decision goes against Open AI, the company still owns the copyright and other intellectual property rights over the language models.
English (US) ·