Eventually I want to trademark my business name (when i actualy make my business) but there is a slight problem. It seems that there is a company with a similar name. The companies name, lets say is "Company Cool" I wanted to name my company "Company Cool LTD" Is this illegal? AND for the record, not that this has anylegal weight, but I thought of the name BEFORE i searched the patent office :P

Fix, you wrote:
>Is this illegal?

No, it's not. But the other party can sue the pants off you for using their trademark. Hire a lawyer. And think up a different name.

We just had a fun experience in Trademark searching, which I will share, to show this exact problem. :) And no, you shouldn't name your company the same thing.

Before we made the company, we needed a name that wouldn't be problematic. The lawyer suggested we come up with 3 alternative name choices, in case there was a problem with the one we chose. Our original name idea was Dueling Sprites (named for an in-joke where the network admin came in, saw the very simple '2 round balls on a grid' game we'd set up and said "Hey, give em both swords, and we're done!") We held a vote and came up with the 3 alternative names:

Alikai Dreams (after a friend who passed away)
Freshno Games (after another in-joke about game balance)
Wyrdon Games (a quick toss-in based on "We're done!")

Alikai and Freshno were immediately no-go, there being companies already similarly named. Alikai's trademark was inactive, but we didn't want to chance it. However, those names were not our #1 choice.

Dueling Sprites was our real first choice. However, upon the lawyer doing a heavy search, he found that Coca-Cola was currently suing Sprite Entertainment for trademark infringement. The lawyer felt that Dueling Sprites was probably safe, but there was some risk. I did some checking and found that Coke had a little browser-based graphical game. After some talk amongst those of us risking our tiny bit of money, we decided we wanted to totally steer clear of it. Sprite is a drink and a sprite is a graphical representation, so odds are we're fine, but Coke has tons of money. :)

That left Wyrdon Games. Since it was an entirely made up word, nobody had it, nobody wanted it and nobody would be defending against it.

So yeah, it's not the name we'd originally wanted, but that's how it goes. It's at least $10,000 to defend a trademark suit, and we don't have that to throw around. It doesn't matter that we thought up names before doing the search. All that matters is that we step on nobody's toes and nobody steps on ours.

So, think up a bunch of names. Do an initial Google search, then some free searching at the uspto. But don't use a name that you find someone has a similar company with a trademark for. If Company Cool is a bread manufacturing concern, you might be able to have Company Cool Games. But it's very complicated law.