OpenAI, the startup behind the revolutionary technology of chatbot ChatGPT, is fighting for the protection of its brand name. The protection is centered around the acronym “GPT,” which is short for Generative Pre-trained Transformer. This deep learning model was released last month and has since gained plenty of attention with applications being developed for it. Towards the end of December, the company applied to the United States Patent and Trademark Office for a trademark for GPT and petitioned the USPTO to move along the process, citing the “myriad infringements and counterfeit apps” that have begun to appear.
USPTO, however, dismissed their petition because their attorneys had neglected to pay an associated fee and provide “appropriate documentary evidence supporting the justification of special action.” Now, OpenAI has to wait in line and hope for a five-month turnaround. According to Jefferson Scher, a partner in the intellectual property group of Carr & Ferrell, it is still unclear whether OpenAI will be able to secure the patent.
Scher explains that the most challenging thing for OpenAI would be to show the USPTO that GPT had been used enough to become socially identified with the company and their products. OpenAI has been using GPT since October 2018 and their sudden growth in popularity has been quite astonishing. If OpenAI can establish that GPT is iconic of the company, then the USPTO would be more likely to grant the patent.
OpenAI is a leading artificial intelligence research company with a mission to ensure that AI benefits all of humanity. Founded by renowned technologists in 2015, the company has received funds from tech giants such as Microsoft and Google. Through a large-scale unsupervised learning algorithm and a massive training corpus it was able to create GPT-1 and GPT-4. On the heels of ChatGPT’s success, OpenAI is looking to protect their technology, the source of their current success.
Jefferson Scher is a partner in the intellectual property group of Carr & Ferrell and is the chairman of their Trademark Practice Group. His expertise and knowledge in this area has allowed him to point out some of the obstacles that OpenAI must face to receive the registration of GPT. His belief is that if OpenAI can display that the acronym is unquestionably connected to their company and their products, then the USPTO would be likely to issue the trademark.
It remains to be seen if OpenAI will manage to protect the use of GPT for themselves without infringing the rights of others. That said, with their immense success in the past year, OpenAI’s chances of gaining their desired patent could be greatly improved. For now, the company will have to wait and see the outcome of their petition.
