Legal Question in Business Law in New York

Re: A company but not yet a business: possible?

I concur, but caution you that failure to use the mark/product might expose you to someone else using it in the interim.

Re: A company but not yet a business: possible?

You can register a name as a trademark without using it. It is called an "Intent to Use" application. The name of your company, however, is not necessarily the name you want for your product or service. The latter is what you may want to trademark.

To create a New York limited liability company, apart from the filing fees, would cost very little. Depending on the type of business, we would probably charge $100.

Lee Black

Re: A company but not yet a business: possible?

You have already received several informative replies to your query prior to mine. However, you may also want to consider the New York State tax implications of froming a corporation, even a corporation that will not transact any business.

The following details may also prove to be helpful and of intterest to you: A pitfall of forming a New York State corporation merely to protect the corporate name is the New York State tax implications. Even a corporation with no assets that does no business and has no profits and no losses must pay a minimum New York State tax of $800 annually.

As regards filing fees in setting up an LLC or corporation: If you were to acquire and to fill out the paperwork yourself, the minimum filing fees payable to New York's Department of State for setting up a corporation would be about $125 plus a small tax (which could be as low as $10) on the corporate stock shares.

The filing fees payable to New York's Department of State (if you acquired and filled out the paperwork yourself) would be $200, plus an additional $50 comprised of two filing fees of $25 each to file Affidavits of Publication from each of two newspapers that each of these two newspapers has published Notice of Formation of your LLC. (These two newspapeprs are selected by the County Clerk in the county in which the office of the LLC is located.)

Re: A company but not yet a business: possible?

Yes, you can form an LLC and register the name as a service mark with the PTO. You will have to file a statement of intended use and the company can remain on paper, so long as it has a registered agent in the state.

The cost of all this will depend on the structure of the LLC however a fair estimate will be approximately $1500 to $2000.

Feel free to contact me if you have any additional questions or would like my assistance.

Kind regards,

Peter Moulinos

Re: A company but not yet a business: possible?

You can file an Intend to Use Trademark application. Given the time delays at the US trademark office, you have approximately 12 months from filing before you have to prove that you are using the trademark. Even then you can get an extension. The cost for a trademark appication is between $900 and $1500, excluding fees. The cost to set up a NY corporation or LLC is between $650 and $2000.