The EU-Taiwan economic and trade relationship remains close. In terms of intellectual property rights, each year, Taiwan files applications for around 700 industrial designs and over 600 trademarks in Europe. The number of industrial designs application requests made by EU member states in Taiwan also increases every year. In 2016, the Taiwan government received application requests for around 1,150 industrial designs and over 3,500 trademarks submitted by the EU member states. Furthermore, both the EU and Taiwan have amended their respective industrial design and trademark regulations in recent years, which will have significant long-term effects on market competition and industry development.

In order to take the pulse of the latest developments on important intellectual property issues in the EU and Taiwan, the Intellectual Property Office (TIPO) under the MOEA, and the European Economic and Trade Office (EETO) under the framework of the European Business and Regulatory Cooperation Programme (EBRC), will co-host the "EU-Taiwan Seminar on Industrial Designs and Trademarks" on Tuesday, 26 September. The seminar will bring together experts from Europe and Taiwan to discuss and examine legal regimes on the invalidity of industrial designs, practices regarding the invalidity of industrial designs, legal regimes regarding trademarks, and trademark practices in the EU and Taiwan, The event aims to further raise mutual understanding through discussions.