The trade mark priority examination page of Brazil's National Institute of Industrial Property (INPI), updated on 2 September, now carries an explicit warning: payment forms under GRU code 3020 for the "virtual marketplace platform" (plataforma de mercado virtual) category are no longer being issued, because the category's quota for the period from 1 September to 31 December has been used up. The category belongs to the INPI's pilot for priority trade mark examination on strategic and public-policy grounds and is aimed at applicants who need a registration in order to trade on an e-commerce platform. Under Portaria Normativa INPI/PR No. 67/2026, phase II of the pilot offers 3,000 requests in 2026, split into two four-month periods of 1,500 each, with a guaranteed floor of 100 per category per period and a cap of 10 requests per applicant; slots are allocated by the date and time of filing, and once the limit is reached the INPI stops accepting new requests. The official fee for this category is R$890, halved to R$445 for micro and small businesses and individual microentrepreneurs.
Those most affected are cross-border sellers and platform-owned brands that must show a Brazilian trade mark registration to the marketplace, together with rights holders trying to secure a registration before a squatter does, since helping to resolve conflicts and disputes is one of the pilot's declared aims. For the rest of this quota period their applications can only be examined in the ordinary queue; where a priority request is not granted, the underlying application continues to be processed normally. The free category for elderly applicants, persons with disabilities, persons with serious illness and Inova Simples companies, and the other paid categories of the pilot, are not covered by the warning and remain subject to their own quotas. J&C recommends that businesses trading or planning to trade on Brazilian marketplaces first check whether they qualify under another pilot category or a free category and, if so, file under that category; those that do not should file an ordinary application as early as possible, keep the platform's request for proof of registration on file, and follow the weekly quota statistics published by the INPI so that they are ready to request priority in the next quota period.
