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ICANN is seeking companies to carry out an independent review of the Trademark Clearinghouse (TMCH) in order to “assess its effectiveness”.
According to ICANN, the three “key areas” for examination in the review include the effectiveness of the TMCH’s guidelines and verification process, sunrise periods, and its claims service.
“The selected provider(s) will design and execute a study to create a meaningful report of quantitative and qualitative data on the specified areas for examination,” ICANN said in a statement.
It is hoped that the TMCH review will also help to identify other issues for evaluation.
Any chosen provider will have to assess questions including how its proposal will affect consumers and competition, what the costs are and who pays for them, and if “the required intellectual property rights protections” have been retained, ICANN said.
The deadline for proposals is August 29. ICANN is hoping to find a provider and to have signed a contract with them by “no later” than October this year.
According to ICANN, the idea for a review stems from a recommendation by the Governmental Advisory Committee (GAC) in May 2011.
The GAC said a post-launch independent review of the TMCH should be carried out one year after the launch of the 75th new generic top-level-domain.
Proposals should be submitted to tmchindependentreview-rfp@icann.org before August 29.
A final report on the TMCH will be published and given to the GAC for review and consideration by February next year, ICANN said.
ICANN, Trademark Clearinghouse, TMCH, gTLD, sunrise period, trademark
