INTELLECTUAL PROPERTY

Since the beginning of the firm, our lawyers have advised and represented clients in a range of intellectual property cases. Our dossier includes:

• protection of EU and Polish trademarks, including renowned trademarks, geographical indications, and other distinguishing indications,
• protection of EU and industrial designs, utility models, patents, plant varieties, topographies of integrated circuits and other industrial property rights,
• protection of copyrights, including copyrights in software,
• protection of business names and other intangible enterprise assets,
• protection of a person’s image and one’s other personality rights,
• advertising law, including protection against misleading advertising and unfair comparative advertising,
• protection of commercial secrets,
• protection against copying products, dissemination of untrue information, inducing breach of contract, impeding market access, through, e.g., dumping or so called “slotting fees”, and other forms of unfair competition.

IP lawyers at SK&S work closely with several other practices at the firm, whenever expertise in other areas of the law is needed, most often with our colleagues in litigation, M&A, real estate, tax, business crime, competition, and labour law.

We handle a variety of cases and projects:

• we elaborate strategies for the protection of intellectual property rights, we issue opinions, we make similarity searches, and we assess the risk of infringement,
• we review the scenarios of advertising campaigns, and participate in the creation and implementation of marketing strategies,
• we represent clients in litigation and arbitration concerned with the infringement of industrial property rights, copyrights, commercial secrets, acts of unfair competition, and acts of unfair advertising; we also appear before the Supreme Court,
• we handle Polish, EU and international proceedings for the registration of trademarks and industrial designs,
• we handle proceedings to oppose, invalidate and extinguish industrial property rights before Poland’s Patent Office (Urząd Patentowy RP), the Polish administrative courts including the Supreme Administrative Court, and before EU bodies, the EUIPO and CJEU,
• we draft and negotiate contracts for the sale and transfer by other means of IP rights, performed with creative and advertising agencies, licensing agreements, franchise agreements and other specialized contracts that address matters of particular relevance to individual market sectors, such as the markets for architectural services, pharmaceuticals, FMCGs, and IT,
• we draft and negotiate contracts for the transfer of technology, including that protected by patents and as confidential know-how, R&D contracts, shared rights contracts, and delimitation and coexistence of rights contracts,
• we carry our audits of IP rights at our clients’ organizations and in those of target companies in M&A transactions,
• we manage the industrial property portfolios of our clients in Poland and worldwide, we supervise the maintenance of exclusive rights and we monitor registers to identify unlawful registration applications worldwide,
• we cooperate with customs authorities and with the police in cases involving counterfeit and pirated goods.

SK&S intellectual property lawyers support international and Polish businesses active in various markets, such as manufacturers of foodstuffs, medical products, luxury goods, cosmetics, software, spirits, and packages, and those active in the health, retail, finances, and sports sectors, as well as in the motor and airways industries. The IP lawyers at our firm are also specialists in business and regulatory matters for the respective markets and industries in which they specialize, and form dedicated teams, such as for the Life Sciences, motor industry, TMT, and matters concerning personal data.