Traineeships At The Office For Harmonization In The Internal Market

Deadline: 31 October 2011 (for February training period), 31 March 2012 (for September training period)
Open to: graduates of EU Member States and nationals from candidate countries and third countries
Remuneration: trainees receive a monthly grant, insurance and travel allowance

The Office for Harmonization in the Internal Market (OHIM) – Trade marks and Designs organizes traineeships twice a year, lasting five months each, for young university graduates of Member States of the European Union and for a number of nationals from candidate countries and third countries. These traineeships consist of work experience in one of the services of the Office. They commence on 1 February (Spring training period) and 1 September (Autumn training period) of each year. Each application should make reference to the training period immediately following the application. It is difficult to give an exact description of the type of work given to trainees, but the traineeships shall aim principally to:

• provide training in industrial property and more specifically in trade mark law;
• extend and apply knowledge acquired in the course of studies or working life;
• enable trainees to acquire personal experience through the contacts they make in their everyday work.

The principal areas of the OHIM’s work are as follows:

• industrial property: trade marks; litigation; appeals; designs; international technical cooperation.
• other areas, in particular: finance; information technology.

Description of posts of the last selection procedure

Eligibility

To be eligible, applicants must:

• be nationals of the Member States of the European Communities and candidate countries. However, a limited number of nationals of  third countries may be accepted.
• have a recognised university degree, proving completion of a full cycle of study, or in the case of trainees who are at the end of their studies, an official attestation from the university stating the marks obtained;
• some initial experience;
• have a thorough knowledge of one official language of the European Communities and a satisfactory knowledge of another language of the European Communities; one of these languages must be a language of the OHIM (Spanish, German, English, French, Italian). For applicants from candidate countries and third countries, a good knowledge of only one of the OHIM’s languages is required.

Remuneration

Trainees will be awarded a monthly grant. The amount of the grant is decided by the Traineeships Office on a yearly basis and is dependent on budgetary constraints. The trainees will receive health and accident insurance. Recruited trainees may receive a travel allowance, subject to budget availability.

Application

For logistical reasons, the Office is only able to accept applications made using the APPLICATION FORM provided for you. It is therefore essential that you use the official application form.

It is very important to enclose scanned copies of university certificates with your application (for applicants who have not yet received their official degree certificate, a statement from their university confirming their degree result is sufficient). Failure to comply with this criterion is the main reason for the rejection of applications. Please keep a copy of all documents sent to the Office. It is not necessary to send certified copies of your certificates.  It is important that you specify your preferences with regard to the department to which you wish to be attached. We strongly advise you to read Decision ADM-06-26, which contains all the necessary information with regard to traineeships at the Office.

Deadlines:
•  31 October (for February training period)
•  31 March (for September training period).

You can contact the Traineeships Office directly at Bureau.Stages@oami.europa.eu. For more informal information about living and working in Alicante, you can also consult a useful practical guide created by previous trainees.

The Official Webpage