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Copyright
Copyright law protects works such as texts, photographs, pieces of music or other intellectual creations against third parties. As soon as a third party has used, reproduced or published your work without authorisation, you can take legal or extrajudicial action against it. We help you to protect your work and to prevent the illegal use of third parties. We can issue warnings and/or obtain interim injunctions in court to protect your rights.
In addition, we help you to draft contracts for the granting of rights of use, see “licensing agreements”.
Trademarks and Designs
In contrast to obtaining copyright protection, trademarks and designs (or design patents) must be registered first. This can be done on a national or international level.
All signs, in particular words including personal names, illustrations, letters, numbers, sound signs, three-dimensional designs, which are capable of distinguishing the goods or services of one company from those of other companies can be protected as trademarks. The protection of a trademark is thus intended to guarantee the recognition value of a product or an enterprise, but also its good name. In everyday economic life, conflicts can arise if you want to register a trademark that already exists like this or in a confusingly similar form. On the other hand, third parties can also violate your trademark rights. In both cases we will be happy to advise you and support you in and out of court.
We will check in advance whether the preconditions for the registration of your trademark or design are fulfilled and evaluate the risk of a conflict of rights. In this respect, we will provide you with a risk assessment with regard to possible conflicts with other trademark and design right holders and, if necessary, we will also advise you in nullity or opposition proceedings.
If a third party uses a trademark or design already registered by you without permission, you will have various rights against them. In such a case, we will be happy to enforce injunctive reliefs, as well as claims for information and damages on your behalf.
Licensing Agreements
If you want to use a copyrighted work, trademark or design of a third party, you will have to agree on a right of use with the right holder. In this respect, we advise you with regard to the drafting or review of corresponding licensing agreements and support you in the negotiations. Proper and tailor-made licensing agreements can stifle potential conflicts. A clear agreement on the licensed use serves both parties in making the intended contractual relationship transparent and unambiguous. It thus prevents misunderstandings and legal disputes.
GDPR stands for: General Data Protection Regulation and refers to the basic data protection regulation which has been directly applicable in all EU member states since 25.05.2018. We would like to briefly highlight the essential aspects of the new regulations for you and present our consulting approach.