Q&A: How can you tell for sure if a company name is already patented or TM’d?

by eyebeam

Question by daisychains: How can you tell for sure if a company name is already patented or TM’d?
And how can I reserve a business name once I know it’s available? Specifically, I’d like to open a publishing inc and an indie music label- both under the same name, for instance xyz publishing inc and xyz records. Is this allowed?

How can I find out more? Can you recommend any good web sites or book titles?

Thanks!

Best answer:

Answer by ynot
Do a search on http://www.uspto.gov the site for the US Patents and Trademarks office. You’ll most likely have to do several searches with several combinations of the words you’re looking for or do an advanced search where they use logical ‘operators’.

Hope this helped.

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