Licenses and Agreements

In many cases, industrial property rights as well as copyrighted use and exploitation rights form the object of an agreement. In detail, a purchase agreement for a protective right may be concerned, but also a licensing agreement for the use of a protective right, as well as a contractual agreement in order to settle a conflict with a third party. We will prepare such agreements, always taking into account your interests and needs, and we conduct the negotiations for you until we reach the best possible outcome. The agreement may be formulated in German, but also in English or in French language, and in cross-border cases the preparation of multilingual agreements is also possible. Moreover, we assist you by verifying any agreements being presented to you by your business partners or third parties and show you the risks as well as the economic effects arising from such agreement. Yet in case of a presumably simple purchase contract for an industrial property right, various special requirements have to be considered depending on the type of protective right, especially concerning domestic and foreign legal requirements which have to be fulfilled.

This also applies to settlement agreements, often being concluded during court proceedings but even more often in advance of legal proceedings. Especially in trademark law in case of a collision of two opposing signs, it is often more effective for the parties concerned to settle the conflict by concluding a delimitation or co-existence agreement. Such a settlement is advantageous, as it can resolve the conflict without taking legal action before court or office, which is expensive and time-consuming. Furthermore, it can clarify a trademark's register entry as well as its state of use. We have many years of experience in the successful settlement of trademark conflicts throughout the world.

In our practice we are furthermore active in the field of drafting license agreements, which are concluded in order to license patents, trademarks, utility models and designs as well as certain know-how to third parties. Yet a single sentence someone says carelessly during a business meeting, can be the basis of a licence agreement, which requires that the field of licensing law should always be considered for each arrangement concerning the use of industrial property rights and know-how, in order not to be exposed to any third-party claims. License agreements are not regulated by law which requires to take special care in avoiding any regulatory gaps upon drafting such a license agreement. Yet the deliberate choice of the license type, be it a single or an exclusive license, causes a lot of subsequent regulations and has to be made at the very beginning, taking into account the business partner, the economic usability and the economic risk. Also important in this respect is to set a minimum license fee or a license rate for the use of the protective right.

In first meetings we determine the basic conditions which are especially important for you as a licensor. After this first meeting, we prepare draft agreements, conduct the negotiations, explain to you possible alternative regulations and their different effects, and thus support you in finally taking a well-founded economic decision. If you come to us as a licensee, we will be pleased to advise you regarding the clauses of the licence agreement offered to you, indicating risks and economic consequences it involves for you. Furthermore, we will verify the legal status of the protective rights to be licensed.

We are looking forward to serving you.

Please contact us by phone at no. +49 221 37 987 900