INTELLECTUAL PROPERTY
LAWYERS

Your brand is one of your most valuable assets: it stands for your values. It’s how your business looks and is perceived. It’s an icon of your business and shorthand for its identity. Legal work for your brand is not a one-off; it’s a partnership. 

Our Brands Practice focuses on holistic, strategic brand management – from the creation of brand strategies and portfolio management, through to enforcement and defence of IP, as well as commercialisation of brand assets.

A business' focus on IP should not be reactive. Given the importance of IP assets, businesses should periodically assess their IP portfolios, latent threats, and contractual and internal IP management to ensure they are maximising value, reducing risk and staying well-prepared for any unforeseen circumstances.

Our IP review service is a standalone support service, working with you to scope out priorities, assess status, identify vulnerabilities, plug gaps and enhance your IP strategy. Useful after or before a corporate transaction, prior to a float, or to respond to or prepare for a significant strategic change, our strategic IP reviews are aimed at future-proofing and adding value across a business’ intangible asset portfolio, processes and challenges. 

Additionally, we regularly conduct registered IP audits to ensure your business’ trade mark and design portfolios align with wider strategy and operations – often identifying cost savings along the way.

As part of our wider Brands offering, we have a dedicated in-house trade mark and design filing practice which provides a truly global service for the protection and pro-active management of our clients' brands. The team are actively involved in helping to design and implement your IP strategy, rather than reactively handling filings.

We manage the UK and worldwide trade mark portfolios of household names, including MoneySuperMarket, Travelodge Hotels, Harrods, Kickers International, Liverpool Football Club, Stella McCartney, Simplyhealth Group, and Samworth Brothers.

We provide a full service on all IP disputes, including IP infringement, ownership claims, oppositions and invalidations, licensing disputes, company name tribunal actions, domain name complaints and online brand enforcement. We're experts not just in IP, but in dispute tactics and strategy, aiming to get you the best result, whether through hard fought litigation in the courts or through strategic management of a dispute to achieve a commercial settlement.

Our team has substantial experience in managing cross jurisdictional IP disputes. As IP is territorial, we draw on international specialists from our overseas offices and our preferred network of foreign firms where required.

We have extensive experience in the High Court, the specialist Intellectual Property & Enterprise Court, and the Court of Appeal as well as in arbitrations and trade mark and design registry proceedings.

Your marketing campaigns help define who you are as a business and your reputation relies upon a successful marketing strategy. 

We can be there through every stage of your marketing campaign, helping you to spot promising opportunities and potential pitfalls at concept stage, and ensuring legal and marketing standards compliance before going live.

We understand the importance of building a robust brand and acknowledge how external factors can influence the perception of you to your customers. Our team can identify and provide you with specialist support in relation to a wide range of issues, including charity promotions, health, nutrition and pharmaceutical claims, green claims, intellectual property concerns, comparative advertising and financial promotions. We navigate rules and guidance, train your teams and clear new copy.

Whilst we have IP specialists working across all sectors, our experience in the retail and fashion industries is truly exceptional. We act for an enviable portfolio of household names across their IP lifecycles, giving us unparalleled sector knowledge and expertise. We recognise and understand the legal and commercial issues that businesses in this sector face, as well as the context in which these businesses exist, and layer that with our legal offering.

We support creatives and designers, protecting their assets and carving out a space in a crowded and constantly developing market. 

We advise on everything from product development and design, through to what to protect and how, and finally enforcement. Our team is well-versed in selecting the correct and most cost-effective protection and enforcement strategies for a business that is constantly creating, as well as dealing with claims for intellectual property infringement brought by third party designers, retailers and brand owners.

We also help high street retailers seeking to appeal to a target market of fashion savvy shoppers, whilst still respecting third party IP and protecting their own brand and reputation. Our advice and assistance to our high-street fashion clients enables them to remain competitive in an industry dictated by short seasons and ever-changing product cycles, and with increasing consumer demand for celebrity and catwalk-inspired design trends.