\>Intellectual property law_

Services

We help clients to register, manage, leverage and protect intellectual property assets, which includes advice in respect of patents, designs, trade marks, copyright, domain names and trade secrets.

Our services include work in the following areas:

  • Advice (e.g. availability, novelty, infringement)
  • Transactions (e.g. licensing, assignments, securitisation)
  • Enforcement (e.g. litigation, oppositions and complaints)
  • Trade marks, anti-counterfeiting
  • Copyright
  • Patents & designs (with our trusted partners)
  • Domain name registration, management, trade mark clearinghouse registrations
  • Advanced watching services

Recent work

Our recent engagements include:

  • Successfully secured global registration of trade mark of a well-known fruit distributor, overcoming various objections and successfully cancelling prior blocking registrations
  • Successfully negotiated a global settlement between two multinational corporations holding registered rights for an identical mark in overlapping territories
  • Overcame registrability objections to pre-eminent European university's flag ship trade mark registration
  • Acted for parastatal in successfully enforcing rights to a domain name
  • Obtained interdict against counterfeit maker of diagnostic motor vehicle tools
  • Advised internationally well-known sportsman on protecting and commercialising global image rights
  • Successfully overcame objections to register the surname of an internationally acclaimed winemaker
  • Successfully migrated large trade mark portfolio as part of a complex cross border international group restructure

Recent blog post

Evergreening: Is it really a case of use it or lose it?

Our previous blog post, which concerned two UK supermarket giants, Lidl and Tesco (https://swart.law/post.aspx?id=112), highlighted a strategy that appears quite often in practice in respect of United Kingdom and European Union trade marks; namely that of 'evergreening'.
Read more...

Memberships & networks