On January 30, 2019, Myanmar’s long-awaited Trademark Law was signed into law, effectively establishing the framework for a comprehensive trademark registration system open to both foreign and domestic trademark owners. This highly anticipated move by the government marks an essential step in its efforts to increase Myanmar’s attractiveness as a destination for foreign investment.   

Thailand has a strong reputation for modernizing digital business regulations in line with international standards, in order to make the jurisdiction an attractive location for international businesses, and its push to do so sometimes has extremely wide-reaching effects on the legal system as a whole. A recent example is Thailand’s Electronic Transaction Act B.E.

Thailand’s Personal Data Protection Act B.E. 2562 (2019) (PDPA), approved by the government earlier this year, was published in the Government Gazette on May 27, 2019.

This article was first published on Franchise Law Insider—a blog maintained by US Law Firm Quarles & Brady LLP—and was co-authored by Sher Hann Chua, a consultant at Tilleke & Gibbins’ Bangkok and Yangon offices, and Bob Smith, a partner in the Washington, DC office of Quarles & Brady LLP.

The Myanmar Ministry of Commerce has set the timeline for foreign-owned and joint venture companies importing or exporting specific categories of goods to apply for retail and wholesale services registration. These changes are outlined in Notification 23/2019 from Myanmar’s Ministry of Commerce (MoC) supporting last year’s opening-up of retail and wholesale to foreign companies (on which see our recent article here).

On May 14, 2019, Thailand’s Cabinet approved the exemption of three categories of service business from Foreign Business License (FBL) requirements. The exemptions, which are expected to be enacted soon by Ministry of Commerce regulations, will permit foreigners to freely engage in the previously restricted activities. The categories of service business to be exempted are:

Amendments to the Non-life Insurance Act B.E. 2535 (1992) and Life Insurance Act B.E. 2535 (1992) were published in the Government Gazette  on May 25, 2019. They will come into force 180 days after publication—i.e. November 21, 2019. These amendments are the first in a series of updates that the Office of Insurance Commission (OIC) intends to introduce to modernize and improve Thailand’s insurance laws.The amendments mainly focus on insurance intermediaries, i.e., agents and brokers. The key changes introduced by the amendments are as follows:

On April 16, 2019, the Drug Act (No. 6) B.E. 2562 was published in the Government Gazette, amending the previous drug registration processes, clinical research processes, and fee schedules. The changes will apply to all pending applications and those filed from October 13, 2019 onward.New Requirements for RegistrationAn additional requirement has been added to the registration process for new drugs. Along with the drug registration dossier, the following documents must now be submitted for each drug classification: