You built the brand from London, New York, Dubai or Singapore. You paid the designer, you chose the name, your foreign company has sold under that sign for years. Then your French partner, manager or distributor files that exact name as a French trademark at the INPI in his own name, without telling you. One morning your lawyer in Paris forwards you the BOPI publication and asks whether you authorised anything. You did not. From 3,000 kilometres away you wonder whether French law really lets the person you trusted walk away with the name of your business.

French trademark law gives you three weapons, and they work even if you live abroad. Within two months of publication you can file an opposition before the INPI. Within five years you can bring a court action to claim ownership of the stolen filing, with no time limit at all if the filer acted in bad faith. And you can have the filing annulled for fraud while obtaining emergency orders that forbid your partner from using the sign. A Paris court recently ordered exactly that against a French depositor who had filed a Brazilian company’s brand behind its back, transferring the French trademark to the true owner and banning any further use under a daily penalty. This guide explains each remedy step by step: what to do in the first 48 hours, how the opposition, ownership claim and nullity action fit together, what damages you can obtain, and how to run the whole case from abroad without boarding a plane. It is written for foreign founders and foreign companies doing business through a French SAS (société par actions simplifiée, the flexible joint-stock company most foreigners choose) or SARL (société à responsabilité limitée, the limited company with heavier statutory rules), and it explains every French acronym as it goes: INPI (Institut national de la propriété industrielle, the French trademark and patent office), BOPI (Bulletin officiel de la propriété industrielle, the weekly bulletin publishing every new filing), RCS (Registre du commerce et des sociétés, the trade register kept by the greffe, the court clerk’s office), and Kbis (the official extract proving a company’s existence).

I. Your French Partner Filed Your Brand at the INPI: How to Freeze the Theft Within Days From Abroad?

A. Check the Filing, Count the Two-Month Deadline and File an INPI Opposition From Abroad

Everything starts with the filing record. Every French trademark application is published in the BOPI a few weeks after it is filed, and the INPI register is searchable online by anyone in the world. Ask your French counsel, or search yourself, for the exact sign filed, the filing number, the filing date, the list of goods and services with their Nice classes, and the name of the depositor. Compare that list with your own activity: if your partner filed your brand in class 3 for cosmetics while your company has sold those cosmetics for years, or in classes 9, 35 and 42 for software and online services that match your product exactly, the overlap proves the filing targets your business. Screenshot the BOPI publication page and the INPI register entry on the day you discover them, because the publication date starts the clock for your fastest remedy.

That remedy is the opposition before the INPI. Article L. 712-4 of the Intellectual Property Code provides that “Dans le délai de deux mois suivant la publication de la demande d’enregistrement, une opposition peut être formée auprès du directeur général de l’Institut national de la propriété industrielle” — within two months of publication of the application, an opposition may be filed with the Director General of the INPI. Only holders of earlier rights may oppose: your earlier foreign trademark, your company name, or even your unregistered brand if it is well known. The opposition is filed online, entirely in writing, and the INPI opposition page confirms the two-month window runs from publication of the French application in the BOPI, or from publication in the WIPO Gazette for an international registration designating France. The official fee starts at 400 euros for one earlier right, plus 150 euros per additional right invoked. Miss the two months and the opposition door closes forever for that filing, so calendar the deadline the day you discover the publication and instruct counsel immediately.

An opposition makes sense whenever you own a registered earlier right, in France or abroad, covering identical or similar goods. Your foreign registration counts: a Brazilian, American or British trademark is an earlier right that can support a French opposition if your sign is identical or confusingly similar and the goods overlap. File the opposition even if you also plan a court action, because the INPI procedure is faster and cheaper than a lawsuit, it freezes the application’s progress toward registration, and it forces your partner to justify his filing in writing. If the two months have already expired when you discover the theft, do not panic: the ownership claim and the nullity action described below remain open for years. But never let a fresh publication sit. Set up an INPI watch (surveillance) on your brand the same week, so that any new filing by your partner, his relatives or his new company triggers an alert within days of publication. Founders who discover the theft eleven months after publication have lost nothing except the cheapest weapon; founders who discover it in week six still hold all three.

From abroad, run a 48-hour evidence protocol. Collect your own earlier trademark certificates with their registration numbers and dates, dated screenshots of your website and online stores showing the brand in use, invoices issued under the brand over several years, the partnership or distribution contract showing your partner knew your brand, and every email or message where the brand, the logo or the French filing project is mentioned. Ask your accountant for dated proof of advertising spending under the brand. If your partner was your agent, distributor or manager, gather the document proving that relationship: distribution agreement, employment contract, shareholders’ agreement, or minutes appointing him president or gérant. French offices decide trademark theft cases on documents, not on hearings, and the file you assemble from your laptop in week one often decides the outcome in year two. Send your partner nothing aggressive yet: a formal letter comes later, drafted by counsel, once the opposition is safely filed and the limitation position secured.

This first stage already answers the question most foreign founders ask: do you need to fly to Paris to oppose? No. The opposition is an online written procedure, your lawyer files it under a signed mandate, and you never appear in person. The same applies to everything that follows. French courts and the INPI routinely handle cases where the true brand owner lives on another continent — the Paris court that transferred a stolen French trademark to a Brazilian company in 2024 heard a claimant based in Brazil, represented by a Paris lawyer, and the judgment was enforced in France without the owner ever travelling. Distance changes the logistics, never the rights.

B. Claim Ownership of the Stolen Filing: the Revendication Action and the Agent Rule That Protects Foreign Brand Owners

The most powerful weapon is the action en revendication, the ownership claim that takes the stolen trademark away from the filer and transfers it to you. Article L. 712-6 of the Intellectual Property Code states that “Si un enregistrement a été demandé soit en fraude des droits d’un tiers, soit en violation d’une obligation légale ou conventionnelle, la personne qui estime avoir un droit sur la marque peut revendiquer sa propriété en justice.” Where registration was applied for in fraud of a third party’s rights, or in breach of a legal or contractual obligation, the person who considers itself entitled to the mark may claim ownership before the courts. A partner who files your brand behind your back commits exactly that fraud: he knows the brand is yours, he knows you never authorised the filing, and he files to capture it. The same article adds a generous time limit: “A moins que le déposant ne soit de mauvaise foi, l’action en revendication se prescrit par cinq ans à compter de la publication de la demande d’enregistrement.” Unless the depositor acted in bad faith, the claim expires five years after publication — which means that against a bad-faith partner, the action never expires.

Foreign founders benefit from a second, tailor-made provision. Article L. 712-6-1 of the Intellectual Property Code provides that “Si une marque protégée dans un Etat partie à la convention de Paris pour la protection industrielle a été enregistrée en France au nom de l’agent ou du représentant du titulaire de cette marque sans l’autorisation de son titulaire, ce dernier peut : 1° S’opposer à l’usage de la marque par son agent ou représentant ; 2° Demander la cession de la marque à son profit.” Where a mark protected in a Paris Convention country is registered in France in the name of the owner’s agent or representative without authorisation, the owner may oppose any use and demand assignment of the mark. Your French distributor, commercial agent, licensee or manager easily qualifies as your agent or representative: the judges look at the real relationship, not the job title. This text comes straight from Article 6septies of the Paris Convention of 20 March 1883, which gives the trademark owner the right to oppose the requested registration or to demand cancellation or transfer of the registration to himself, unless the agent justifies his conduct — the right to oppose the requested registration or to demand cancellation or transfer of the registration, unless the agent justifies his conduct. A partner who cannot explain why he filed your brand in his own name loses.

These provisions are not theory. On 25 September 2024 the Paris judicial court decided a case almost identical to yours: a French resident had filed the French semi-figurative mark Minoa Professional while the Brazilian company 2K Cosmeticos owned the earlier Brazilian brand and had worked with her. The court recalled the rule word for word — “Selon l’article L.712-6 du code de la propriété intellectuelle, si un enregistrement a été demandé soit en fraude des droits d’un tiers, soit en violation d’une obligation légale ou conventionnelle, la personne qui estime avoir un droit sur la marque peut revendiquer sa propriété en justice” — then drew the consequence: “Ordonne la transfert de la propriété de la marque française semi-figurative “Minoa Professional” n° 4844474 à la société 2K Cosmeticos ;” (Paris judicial court, 25 September 2024, RG 24/06035). The Brazilian owner recovered the French trademark, the judgment is sent to the INPI for entry in the national register, and the court added a forward-looking ban: “Interdit à Mme [L] et à la société Ky Beauty 2 tout usage en France du signe “Minoa Professional” de quelque manière que ce soit dans le délai de trente jours suivant la signification de la présente décision puis sous astreinte de 200 euros par jour pendant cent quatre-vingts jours ;” — any use of the sign in France banned within thirty days of service, then subject to a 200-euro daily penalty for 180 days. The court also ordered the withdrawal of all products bearing the sign from French trade channels under the same penalty, plus 5,000 euros in damages for unfair competition and 10,000 euros in legal costs. That is the complete toolkit in one judgment: transfer, ban, withdrawal, damages.

Three practical lessons follow for your case. First, frame your claim as revendication first and nullity second: the transfer gives you the registration, while nullity alone merely destroys it and leaves the name free for anyone to re-file. Second, plead both L. 712-6 fraud and L. 712-6-1 agency in the alternative, so the court can grant the transfer even if it characterises the relationship differently from your pleading. Third, quantify bad faith from day one: the partner’s knowledge of your brand, the absence of any authorisation in writing, the identity of the sign and the goods, and any concealment, such as filing while negotiating with you or using company funds to pay the filing fee. Bad faith removes the five-year limit entirely, which matters if you discover the theft late. If your partner already held the registration for six or seven years before you noticed, bad faith is what keeps your action alive.

For foreign groups structuring their French presence, this dispute carries a structural message developed in our hub guide on setting up a company in France as a foreign founder: file your French trademark before your partner does, in the name of the company or person who must own it, and record licences and distribution terms in writing. A French filing costs a few hundred euros; a revendication lawsuit costs dozens of times more and takes a year or longer. But if the theft already happened, the law is on the side of the true owner who can prove it.

II. How Do You Win the Case, Stop the Use and Get Compensated Without Coming to France?

A. Annul the Fraudulent Filing and Forbid Any Use: Nullity, Infringement and Emergency Orders

Alongside the ownership claim, French law lets you destroy the fraudulent filing itself. Article L. 714-3 of the Intellectual Property Code provides that “L’enregistrement d’une marque est déclaré nul par décision de justice ou par décision du directeur général de l’Institut national de la propriété industrielle, en application de l’article L. 411-4, si la marque ne répond pas aux conditions énoncées aux articles L. 711-2, L. 711-3, L. 715-4 et L. 715-9.” Registration is declared void by a court or by the INPI Director General where the mark fails the statutory conditions, including prior rights. The starting point is what a trademark is: Article L. 711-1 of the Intellectual Property Code defines it as “un signe servant à distinguer les produits ou services d’une personne physique ou morale de ceux d’autres personnes physiques ou morales” — a sign that distinguishes one person’s goods or services from another’s. A sign your partner copied from you distinguishes nothing; it merely captures your identity. Registration then confers ownership — Article L. 713-1 of the Intellectual Property Code states that “L’enregistrement de la marque confère à son titulaire un droit de propriété sur cette marque pour les produits ou services qu’il a désignés” — which is precisely why the law organises the annulment of registrations that should never have existed. Since the 2019 reform, the INPI Director General decides nullity and revocation petitions directly — Article L. 411-4 of the Intellectual Property Code states that “Le directeur général de l’Institut national de la propriété industrielle prend les décisions prévues par le présent code à l’occasion de la délivrance, du rejet ou du maintien des titres de propriété industrielle” — so you can attack a fraudulent filing administratively before the INPI, or judicially before the courts, or both in a coordinated sequence.

Courts show no mercy to depositors who file brands to harm or blackmail the true owner. On 18 December 2025 the Aix-en-Provence Court of Appeal confirmed the INPI’s cancellation of a mark filed to block its true owner, holding that “le dépôt de la marque le 20 avril 2023 par M. [F] a été effectué sans intention de l’utiliser, dans le but de priver la société Festina de son libre usage ultérieur pour en tirer profit” and that “L’ensemble de ces éléments suffit à caractériser le caractère frauduleux du dépôt et la mauvaise foi de son déposant” (Aix-en-Provence Court of Appeal, 18 December 2025, RG 24/10799). Filing without intent to use, to deprive the true owner of free use and extract profit: that factual pattern matches the partner who files your brand to force a buyout, to keep the name after a falling-out, or to sell it back to you. Note the procedural point too: the INPI Director General had already cancelled the mark on 30 July 2024, and the court confirmed that administrative cancellation. The administrative route is real, fast and effective against bad-faith filings.

Once you own the rights, or while the dispute runs, any commercial use of your brand by the partner is infringement. Article L. 716-4 of the Intellectual Property Code states that “L’atteinte portée au droit du titulaire de la marque constitue une contrefaçon engageant la responsabilité civile de son auteur.” Any interference with the owner’s rights is infringement engaging civil liability. The Court of Cassation applies this firmly, including against exporters: Under Articles L. 713-2 and L. 716-10 of the Intellectual Property Code, reproducing a mark for goods or services identical to those covered by the registration is forbidden without the owner’s consent, as is exporting goods bearing an infringing mark (Court of Cassation, commercial chamber, 17 January 2018, appeal no. 15-29.276, published in the Bulletin). Even affixing the mark in France on goods destined for export infringes. For your case the message is direct: your partner cannot sell under your brand in France, cannot export goods bearing it, and cannot hide behind a company vehicle, since the courts examine who actually decided the infringing use.

You do not have to wait for final judgment to stop the bleeding. Article L. 716-4-6 of the Intellectual Property Code provides that “Toute personne ayant qualité pour agir en contrefaçon peut saisir en référé la juridiction civile compétente afin de voir ordonner, au besoin sous astreinte, à l’encontre du prétendu contrefacteur ou des intermédiaires dont il utilise les services, toute mesure destinée à prévenir une atteinte imminente aux droits conférés par le titre ou à empêcher la poursuite d’actes argués de contrefaçon.” Anyone entitled to sue for infringement may ask the interim-relief judge to order, under penalty if needed, any measure preventing imminent harm or stopping ongoing infringement. In practice your lawyer requests a ban on any use of the brand, withdrawal of infringing products and websites, and a daily penalty per day of delay, all within weeks through the référé procedure. A bailiff’s seizure of infringing goods (saisie-contrefaçon), authorised by court order, can secure evidence from the partner’s warehouse or store before he makes it disappear. These emergency tools explain why acting fast matters more than acting loudly: a quiet court order in month two beats an angry email chain in month twelve.

Choose the forum with care. Ownership, nullity and infringement claims over French trademarks are heard by the judicial courts, and in practice the Paris judicial court concentrates most of this litigation — its third chamber decided the Minoa transfer case. If your company’s registered office sits in Paris or the Île-de-France, Paris counsel can handle the INPI opposition, the administrative nullity petition and the court case as one coordinated file. Appeals against INPI Director General decisions follow their own appellate track, while infringement and revendication judgments go to the Court of Appeal. Your lawyer maps this at the first meeting so that limitation periods, pending INPI deadlines and court filings never collide. EU and international dimensions can be added where relevant: if your partner also filed an EU trademark at the EUIPO (European Union Intellectual Property Office) or designated France through WIPO (World Intellectual Property Organization), parallel opposition and cancellation proceedings exist in Alicante and Geneva, and the French evidence file serves there too.

B. Get Paid for the Harm, Punish Repeat Offenders and Lock the Brand Down: Damages, Customs and Company Sanctions

Winning the brand back is half the victory; the other half is money. Every faulty use of your brand obliges its author to compensate you: Article 1240 of the Civil Code provides that “Tout fait quelconque de l’homme, qui cause à autrui un dommage, oblige celui par la faute duquel il est arrivé à le réparer.” Any act causing damage to another obliges the person at fault to repair it. In trademark theft cases the damage has several layers: the royalties you should have received for the French use of your brand, the profits your partner diverted by trading on your reputation, the dilution of your brand’s distinctiveness, the moral harm of seeing your name misused, and the legal costs of taking it back. French courts award a lump sum covering these heads, calibrated on the duration and scale of the misuse — the Minoa court granted 5,000 euros for unfair competition on top of the transfer and the ban, plus 10,000 euros in irrecoverable legal costs, in a case where the misuse was recent and circumscribed. Where your partner sold for years under your brand across France, the claim runs far higher: produce your licence rates or comparable market royalties, your partner’s turnover under the sign, and evidence of confused customers. Courts can also order publication of the judgment at the infringer’s expense, a remedy that hurts a dishonest partner more than a fine.

Think beyond the courtroom and block the goods physically. French customs can detain goods suspected of infringing your trademark at the border under the EU customs enforcement system: file a customs intervention request (demande d’intervention) with the French customs authority, describing your brand, your registrations and the suspected infringing shipments, and customs will hold suspicious consignments and notify you so your lawyer can inspect and sue. This matters because a partner who loses the French case sometimes shifts stock through neighbouring countries or keeps exporting under the sign — the exact conduct the Court of Cassation condemned in the 2018 Castel ruling. Combine the customs request with the court-ordered withdrawal of products from French trade channels, as granted in the Minoa case, and with takedown requests to online marketplaces once you hold the transfer judgment or the INPI decision. Each channel closed raises the cost of disobedience and pushes the partner toward settlement.

Then turn to the company itself, because the brand thief is often also your associé, your president or your gérant. A manager who files the company’s brand in his own name breaches his duty of loyalty to the company: convene the shareholders, vote his removal (révocation) in compliance with the articles and the notice periods, and appoint a successor who signs the court mandate and the customs request. Check who paid the INPI filing fees: if company money funded the personal filing, that payment evidences both the fraud and a misuse of corporate assets, and it belongs in the court file. Review the shareholders’ agreement for non-compete, non-solicitation and intellectual-property assignment clauses — many foreign founders discover too late that their pacte d’associés says nothing about who owns the brand. After victory, repair the documents: assign the recovered trademark to the right entity in writing, record the assignment at the INPI so the register matches reality, align the shareholders’ agreement with the filing strategy, and extend protection to the EU trademark and key export markets. A brand owned clearly, filed early and watched permanently never gets stolen twice.

Run the economics honestly before suing. An INPI opposition costs the official fee plus counsel’s fixed fee and concludes within roughly a year. An administrative nullity petition before the INPI costs less than a full court case. A revendication plus infringement action before the Paris court takes twelve to twenty-four months at first instance and requires a real budget — provision fees, bailiff costs for the seizure, and the 10,000-euro scale of adverse-costs orders seen in recent cases. Against that, weigh the brand’s French turnover, the cost of rebranding if you lost the name, and the settlement leverage a transfer claim creates: most partners settle once they understand that bad faith removes the time limit, that the Minoa precedent transfers the mark rather than merely cancelling it, and that daily penalties accumulate automatically. Your lawyer should send the formal demand only when the file is ready — opposition filed or deadline checked, evidence preserved, customs request prepared — so the letter proposes a dated assignment of the mark, a use ban, product withdrawal and compensation, with court proceedings as the stated alternative. Partners who laughed at emails sign assignments when they read that program on letterhead.

Paris and Île-de-France specifics deserve a final word, since most foreign founders base their French company there. Trademark litigation concentrates in Paris: specialised counsel, bailiffs experienced in infringement seizures, and judges who decide these cases weekly. If the partner operates a shop, warehouse or office in Paris or the inner suburbs, the seizure and enforcement measures execute quickly through local enforcement officers (commissaires de justice, formerly huissiers). Serve every act at the addresses shown on the Kbis extract and the INPI register, which may differ — the partner sometimes files the mark from his home address while the company sits elsewhere — and verify both through the greffe and the INPI register before instructing the bailiff. A seizure that knocks on the wrong door wastes the surprise effect that makes these measures decisive.

Conclusion

A partner who files your brand at the INPI has stolen the roof while you paid for the house — but French law hands the house back to the owner who proves it. The two-month opposition freezes the application’s progress. The revendication action transfers the stolen registration to you, with no time limit where the filer acted in bad faith, and the dedicated agent rule protects foreign owners whose French representative filed without authorisation. Nullity before the INPI or the courts destroys fraudulent filings, infringement law bans any commercial use and punishes exports under the stolen sign, and interim orders with daily penalties stop the misuse within weeks rather than years. The Paris Minoa judgment shows the full sequence working for a Brazil-based owner who never set foot in the courtroom: transfer of the French mark, use ban under penalty, product withdrawal, damages and costs. Mirror that method in your case: screenshot and calendar the publication, file the opposition inside two months where possible, assemble the proof of your earlier rights and the partner’s knowledge, then claim ownership first, nullity second, infringement and damages third, from abroad through a Paris mandate. And the next time you enter France — through the formation steps described in our hub guide on setting up a company in France as a foreign founder — file the French trademark on day one, in the right owner’s name, with a written assignment clause in the shareholders’ agreement. Prevention costs hundreds of euros; recovery costs a lawsuit. Both beat losing your name.