# Brandenburg Higher Regional Court on the Distinctiveness of an eGbR Name > OLG Brandenburg denies registrability of an eGbR where street, house number and legal-form suffix do not ensure clear distinction. Source: https://www.mtrlegal.com/en/olg-brandenburg-egbr-name-distinctiveness/ · Language: en · Updated: 2026-10-21 --- ## Decision of the OLG Brandenburg on the Naming of an eGbR The Oberlandesgericht Brandenburg (OLG Brandenburg, Brandenburg Higher Regional Court), by decision of 11 August 2026 – 14 W 27/26 – had to decide on the registrability of the name of a registered civil-law partnership. The central question was whether a designation consisting solely of a street name, a house number and the legal-form suffix “eGbR” has the required distinctiveness. According to the decision, the registered name “X-Straße 11 eGbR” did not meet the statutory requirements. The decisive factor was that the street name used occurs several times in Germany and that house number 11 also exists in several streets bearing this designation. ## Application for Registration in the Company Register and Objection ### Parties Involved and Registered Name The parties involved were partners in a Gesellschaft bürgerlichen Rechts (GbR, civil-law partnership) that had been established under the name “X-Straße 11 eGbR”. They applied for the company to be entered in the Gesellschaftsregister (company register) under this designation. The Registergericht (registry court) objected to the application by way of an interim order. It took the view that the registered name was not registrable due to a lack of distinctiveness and had to be changed. ### Appeal Against the Interim Order The parties involved lodged an appeal against this objection. However, the OLG Brandenburg maintained the assessment of the registry court. The appeal was unsuccessful. In the court’s view, the company’s name did not meet the requirements of § 707b No. 1 BGB (German Civil Code) in conjunction with [§ 18 para. 1 HGB (German Commercial Code)](https://www.gesetze-im-internet.de/hgb/__18.html). The designation lacked the necessary capacity to distinguish the company sufficiently from other business entities in legal and commercial dealings. ## Requirements for Distinctiveness ### Street Name and House Number Were Not Sufficient in This Specific Case The OLG based its decision on the fact that “X-Straße” occurs several times as a street name in Germany. According to the decision, the addition of the house number also did not lead to sufficient individualisation, because house number 11 likewise exists in several of these streets. It is true that an address with a house number may be sufficient in an individual case if confusion can be virtually ruled out on that basis. However, the court did not consider this requirement to be met here. According to the decision, at least the indication of the city or municipality in which the property in question is located was missing. In the court’s reasoning, only such an additional designation could have further specified the attribution in legal and commercial dealings. ### Partnership Agreement and Application Documents Were Not Sufficient The fact that the location of the property may have been apparent from the partnership agreement or from the application documents was not sufficient in the view of the OLG Brandenburg. In support of this, the court pointed out that these documents are not readily accessible to the public in legal and commercial dealings. For the assessment of the naming, the decisive factor was therefore the registered name itself. On its own, it had to convey the distinctiveness required under § 18 para. 1 HGB. ## No Sufficient Descriptive Company Name ### Street Names May Be Distinguishing Additions in Individual Cases The court also addressed the question of whether the street name can be understood as a distinguishing addition. In principle, street names can help to sufficiently individualise a descriptive company name. According to the decision, however, there was no descriptive company name in the first place. For that to be the case, the designation would also have had to include, in addition to the street, an indication of the sector or field of activity. ### Real Estate Activity Was Not Apparent from the Name According to the court’s findings, the designation “X-Straße 11 eGbR” did not indicate that the company operates in the field of real estate management. The mere combination of street, house number and legal-form suffix therefore did not convey sufficient information about a sector or field of activity. According to the decision, there was thus not only a lack of sufficient individualisation by means of the specific location reference, but also no classification as a descriptive company name with a distinguishing addition. ## Classification Within the Case Law of the OLG Brandenburg ### Earlier Decision of 9 April 2025 At first glance, the decision appears to stand in tension with an earlier decision of the OLG Brandenburg of 9 April 2025 – 7 W 20/25. This earlier decision was issued by the 7th Civil Senate and likewise concerned an eGbR whose name consisted of a street designation and a house number. In that case, the OLG Brandenburg affirmed distinctiveness. The decision was expressly based on § 18 para. 1 and para. 2 HGB. The court emphasised there that it was not merely the street name or only the municipality that had been stated, but specifically a concrete address with a house number. The key difference was that the street name at issue at that time occurred only once throughout Germany. According to the assessment at that time, the specific address was therefore capable of eliminating a risk of confusion with other companies that might bear the same street name. The earlier decision has also been published in the headnote in MittBayNot 2025, Issue 6, p. 581. The DNotI documentation on this decision was last updated on 4 September 2025; no appeal to the Bundesgerichtshof (BGH, Federal Court of Justice) is noted there. ### Further Register Decision of 2 September 2025 Between the two decisions lies a further register decision of the OLG Brandenburg of 2 September 2025 – 7 W 48/25. In that case, the appeal against an interim order of the registry court bearing the register reference 40 AR 33/25 CB was dismissed. The subject matter there was the lack of distinctiveness of a generic designation. In this line of reasoning, the Senate examined whether the company name is capable of distinguishing the business entity from others. Mere generic or sector designations are not sufficient for this purpose. In particular, the following points of assessment can be derived from this case law: - The name must be capable of distinguishing the business entity from others. - A merely descriptive indication is generally not sufficient. - A specific address may be sufficient in an individual case. - The decisive factors remain the circumstances of the respective name and the individualisation that it is capable of conveying. ## Critical Assessment of the Current Decision The current decision of the OLG Brandenburg appears strict. The court did not base its assessment on whether another company with exactly the same name already exists anywhere in Germany. Rather, it denied distinctiveness simply because the same street name and the same house number occur several times in Germany. By contrast, distinctiveness can also be understood by reference to whether the public in legal and commercial dealings perceives the designation as an individualising reference to a particular business entity. As long as no other company uses the same name consisting of street and house number, sufficient distinctiveness may be considered, even if the same street-and-house-number combination occurs several times outside company designations. The decision therefore shows that the requirements for naming an eGbR in register proceedings are assessed carefully on the basis of the specific designation. For companies, investors and high-net-worth individuals, the choice and registrability of a name can be of considerable practical importance. In the event of legal questions concerning the establishment, registration or structuring of a company, MTR Legal provides support as part of its [legal advice in corporate law](https://www.mtrlegal.com/rechtsberatung/gesellschaftsrecht/).